


Chances Are

by Berty



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: 69 (Sex Position), Aphasia, Canon Divergence - The Great Game, Developing Relationship, Emotions, First Kiss, First Time, Friends to Lovers, Head Injury, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, John Watson Whump, John Watson is a Good Doctor, M/M, Medical Procedures, Muteness, Mycroft Being Mycroft, POV Sherlock Holmes, Post-Episode: s01e03 The Great Game, Revelations, Sherlock Holmes Has Feelings, Sherlock Whump, Sherlock's Mind Palace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-15
Updated: 2020-07-30
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:14:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 51,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25280701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Berty/pseuds/Berty
Summary: Sherlock is spending some time in his mind palace - so far, so normal. But why is John there, why do things keep changing and why are there only two exits from the sitting room at 221B, neither of which seem to go anywhere useful?It's a case like no other for Sherlock Holmes and John Watson.
Relationships: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Comments: 474
Kudos: 424
Collections: 10 Years of Sherlock, Sherlock and John Stories that Ease the Soul





	1. The Flood

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Шансы (Chances Are)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27834841) by [Lesli_rus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lesli_rus/pseuds/Lesli_rus)



> So, for the purists among us, I haven’t stuck entirely with the chronological timeline for the Series 1, which saw the events of the three episodes mashed into about eight weeks - end of January to end of March 2010. (No wonder John started to go grey!) I have taken a more leisurely approach in this story and given Sherlock and John several more months to get to know each other. Call it whimsy, call it artistic license, call it the idiot author having a meltdown - whatever you will. 
> 
> Chapter count may change. The story is written, the end is still in beta in jbaillier's gentle, loving hands, so I'm waiting to see where the chapter breaks will fall.

At first it’s blinding light and a wall of pressure, like being lifted and shoved aside by a massive, invisible hand. In an instant the heat registers: suffocating, rolling and fierce, it scrubs at his flesh and roars in his ears with a stabbing pain that doesn’t recede. He opens his mouth to shout, but the burning air steals sound and oxygen from him, leaving nothing but the flavour of the inferno on his tongue, all moisture evaporated. There’s the strangest sensation of weightlessness and spinning, and something makes him expect a second impact, a reverberating shockwave.

When it doesn’t come, Sherlock is confused. He feels he’s falling for the longest time, but with the quiet certainty that at the bottom there will be a place he can rest, a place that’s dark and cool and numb. He yearns for it — even if just to stop the shrieking in his head and the sickening sensitivity of his skin.

Waiting to land, something tugs at him, increasing the agony, opening wounds on the blistered surface of his body. He resists; curls in on himself. The pain is too wide, too heavy to grasp. He tries to disengage from the insistent pull and, when that fails, he disengages from his consciousness instead, floating away with the knowledge that he’s leaving behind something important.

Vitally so.

>>>>><<<<<

Already the water is pouring through the gaps between the door and the jamb, inching higher with each passing second. Sherlock can feel the deadly weight of it behind him through the wood. He knows that it is only a matter of seconds until the pressure of the water overwhelms the lock, his own strength and possibly the integrity of the entire wall at his back.

The flood is relentless. He’s lost track of how long he has been trying to evade it. Hours? Days? Utterly exhausted, the thought of running again fills him with bitter helplessness, enough to momentarily prick tears from the corners of his eyes. He dashes the moisture away; there is no time for that now. He forces down the knife-sharp edge of panic that wells up, threatening to steal any chance of rational thought. Compelling himself to think, he renews his focus on the exits available to him although his mind is sluggish and reluctant. He knows this place like the back of his hand, but he cannot marshal his thoughts sufficiently to plan a route that will take him somewhere safe, struggling to even think beyond the next doorway.

He can turn left and make for the corridor, but it’s a long way to run until he reaches the next door that he can barricade against the oncoming flood. Perhaps he could take the door directly ahead of him into his old dorm room where he stores data on school fellows, their families and business connections, but he can’t remember if there are any other exits from there. Bewildered and overwhelmed, he cannot see any options beyond the swing doors to the left. He takes a deep breath and runs, not looking behind him as a sickening, splintering sound precedes the relentless rush of the water at his heels.

Bursting through the doors into his favourite of Imperial College’s RCS1 research labs, he blocks the doorway with filing cabinets, two benches and as many stools as he can lay hands on. Within seconds the water has begun to seep beneath the door again. Sherlock spins; there are two more exits to choose from. One leads to his mother’s study (mathematicians) and the other is the stairwell from his grand-mère’s house in Paris (genealogy and heraldry), which will lead him to… he can’t think now. Is it the kitchen garden at Musgrave (fungi) or is it the British Museum’s first floor (Egyptology, embalming, tissue decay rates, preservatives and arid climate dehydration characteristics)?

The benches start to squeak on the institutional linoleum as the force of the flood continues its inexorable advance. He has to choose quickly. Already the water is rushing over his shoes and pulling at his ankles, flowing fast and strong, trying to tug his feet from under him.

He closes his eyes, fingers to temples and attempts to force his mind to comply, but the currents pull and push, making it hard for him to concentrate. It’s a huge effort and it shouldn’t be, but basic logic comes back online sufficiently to nudge him. Mummy’s study is small; it will fill quickly so he turns towards the oak door with the brass handle that has been worn shiny under generations of his family’s hands.

He’s wading now. The water is almost at his thighs, making progress slow and laboured. His feet catch on the debris – not items from this room, but things washed in from all the rooms he has abandoned before. Each one of those objects is significant; they are places where he has left the accumulated knowledge and experience he has from the age of six when he began to catalogue, yet he cannot now put a name to a single one of the subjects they embrace. All are simply debris in the face of the oncoming tide, devoid of meaning. They swirl around him, tangling in each step, impeding him.

The rush of the water washes a stool into the back of his legs and his knees buckle. He goes down, grabbing at anything to keep from being swept away. His hand finds something solid and he clings to it, but in only seconds it is just another piece of flotsam and his head sinks below the water. He tries to gasp breaths each time he’s able to force his way back to the surface, but he’s got his hands full just avoiding the most dangerous pieces as they loom out of the dark flood and collide with him with uncanny accuracy.

Finally, he is swept into the wall, where the currents collect and conspire to keep him under. Try as he might, he cannot force a path through the weight of the water to get a breath. Swallowing down the panic becomes harder as each of his attempts fail and his lungs begin to ache with the need for air. He flails with his arms, searching for something to climb to get above the surface, and his hand meets something that makes sudden hope bloom like kindling catching a flame in his chest – a familiar hand, grasping his own and tugging.

_ John. _

Sherlock’s heart lifts despite their immediate predicament. For a crazy instant, he thinks he might laugh at the ridiculous situation they are in – it wouldn’t be the first time inappropriate giggles caught up with them.

Together, they have the strength to break the current’s hold. With one hand gripping the door to the stairwell, John pulls Sherlock from the grasping flood and, with an almost inhuman burst of strength, he heaves them both through the door and forces it closed behind them.

Coughing and spitting, Sherlock leans heavily against the bannister trying to catch his breath, and takes a moment to get a good look at his friend. His hair is plastered back against his scalp and he shivers from the bitterly deluge. Yet, even soaked to the skin, John Watson is a force to be reckoned with. His expression, the set of his shoulders, his whole posture is as solid as ever; he might not know how to win this one, but he’s not admitting defeat until there’s nothing else left to him. Even then, he’ll probably look the end in the eye and dare it to do its worst. 

He is magnificent. 

If today is Sherlock’s day to die, he cannot imagine a better man to die beside. 

John’s face is focussed and serious, chin lifted and eyes like chips of flint.

“Up or down?” he shouts over the thunder of the water pushing against the flimsy oak. He strains against the force of the door being inexorably pushed beyond its integrity, his feet scrabbling for traction.

They have mere seconds to make this decision.

Sherlock takes a deep breath and looks up, craning his neck to see only more stairs, then tips his head to look down over the ornate scrollwork of the wooden bannister. There’s something down there – a flicker of light, warm and inviting, that seems to suggest safety. It’s counterintuitive to choose to go downwards with the palace filling with water but despite logic and simple science, he can’t shake the feeling that it’s the right thing to do.

“Down,” he calls and John nods his agreement with no time for discussion. He takes a deep breath and pushes off from the door, pausing beside Sherlock.

“Ready?” he asks.

They begin their descent, John ahead of Sherlock now.

The treads already have a constant stream of water flowing from one to the next like an elaborate and strangely even waterfall. Sherlock can hear John calling for him to hurry as the torrent intensifies. He has to focus on each step, ensuring the placement of his feet each time before he trusts his weight to them. The drag of the flow tries to sweep him down and more than once he slips, sliding a few steps and grasping reflexively at the bannister, his heart in his throat. He’s almost at the bottom, just one more return to navigate when he hears the wood fail. 

The roar when the door breaks is amplified by the stairwell. The waterfall becomes a tsunami. Sherlock cannot spare the time or the focus to observe. With five steps left to go, he feels the deluge at his back, filling his ears with its angry wailing, shrill whistles and the erratic thump of debris hitting the walls. The shock when the full force of the water hits him is enough to make him gasp. Spiteful splashes leap to slap his face, get in his eyes and fill his mouth, even as he feels his feet lose contact with the ground. The current spins him, toying with him, pushing him this way and that. A sudden pain in his chest and back makes him cry out; he cannot see what has collided with him, but he has barely breathed once before it does it again, the force of it pinning him to the wall. He cannot catch another breath, his ribs burn and the pressure of the water prevents him from expanding his chest to suck in some critically needed air. There are only seconds before he will slip into unconsciousness; already its buzz and whine are louder than the water, and the edges of his vision are slipping into greyness.

With one last, massive effort he kicks off from the wall and heaves himself at the first door in the corridor he has been washed into. It opens at his touch and he is inside, trembling and gasping for breath. Utterly spent, his palms flat against the door, waiting for the vibrations from the deluge, he wonders if he has anything more to give or whether he has just delayed the inevitable.

The expected thunder of displaced water doesn’t materialise; the desperation of his arrival and this serene sanctuary are utterly at odds. With mounting confusion Sherlock realises he isn’t even wet. He frowns in incomprehension; none of this makes any sense. He spins on his heel, his coat flaring out behind him as he turns and scrutinises the surroundings.

The source of the flickering light from earlier is revealed; a fire in the hearth, crackling in the drifting shadows of early evening. Somehow, the sound of this and the traffic outside the window are not drowned out by the flood. Sherlock stares in disbelief; the clock on the wall, the armchairs facing each other across the faded hearthrug, the skull grinning toothily at his bemusement. This is Baker Street – a place more firmly etched in his mind than any other. But surely… the water and the…

It takes a moment to persuade himself to step away from the door although he cannot now quite say why. Cautiously moving further into the room, Sherlock searches for the thread of his thoughts. It is distressingly difficult to recall why he is here and what he has been doing. Sleeping perhaps? Or high? He doesn’t remember it being so late in the day. Was it an experiment that he was running? Something about light; red dots in front of his eyes and…

God, he’s tired. It settles on him like a coat made of lead, as if the very effort of standing up is too much.

“Hi,” John says.

Sherlock hadn’t immediately noticed him, but strangely, he isn’t surprised that he’s here. After all, John was with him on the… stairs? He wonders what that even means as his thoughts slip from his grasp.

“You’re home.” John regards him over the top of his book and gives him a genuinely pleased smile.

Sherlock wonders if the observation is an answer to a question or one of the blazingly obvious comments John is so fond of making.

Folding down the corner of his paperback, John drops it on the floor and settles back, resting his hands on the worn arms of his chair. “Tea?”

He looks as if he’s been here always, just waiting for Sherlock to arrive. 

“Your clothes are dry. When did you have time to change?” Sherlock asks softly, frowning slightly at the latest in a seemingly inexhaustible supply of checked shirts. The recollection, once spoken, dissolves altogether from his mind. Again. Shaking his head, Sherlock tries to hang on to the melting impressions that tease him from the dark corners of his memory. It’s infuriating, like dreams that dissolve with the barest hint of scrutiny. He turns in a tight circle and squeezes his eyes shut. He chases the logic which makes him question his surroundings, but it eludes him.

He tries to frame his scattered thoughts and impressions into something usable but as soon as a memory floats to the surface, it is gone, and he’s left with nothing but a tantalising space where it had been; an echo only, empty and meaningless.

>>>>><<<<<

**“God! Sherlock, can you hear me? Sherlock? Stay with me!”**

“Of course I can hear you,” Sherlock replies, startling, as if he is waking from a deep sleep. He wonders if John is feeling quite himself. What is the man talking about? Stay with him? Where else would he be going? “Why are you making such a racket? I’m right here.”

He doesn’t recall sitting down or changing into his pyjamas and dressing gown, but John is placing a mug of tea at Sherlock’s elbow and settling himself in the opposite armchair. A glance at the room shows that otherwise nothing has changed. He must have simply… withdrawn into his mind palace and lost track of time.

John just looks at him and smiles softly, his eyebrows drawing together in mild perplexity, his posture relaxed. He’s wearing a comfortable jumper, the old one with stripes, the one he puts on when he’s had a trying day. It looks soft, warm and more casual than he usually wears. Sherlock likes it because John never wears it outside; it always smells of home. 

“Hmm?”

Another wave of exhaustion ripples over Sherlock, cold and so hard he shudders. He never falls asleep in his chair; it simply wasn’t designed for it yet sleep reaches for him with insistent fingers. He turns his eyes to the fire, hoping for distraction from his fatigue and a little heat to warm his icy hands, but they slip shut again and . His eyelids are ridiculously heavy and each blink lasts longer than the one before. There is a pressure building within the confines of his skull making it feel too small to contain his thoughts and his memories. Too small to contain  _ him _ .

**“Sherlock! Sherlock! Can you open your eyes for me? Oh God! Just hang on. Can you hear me? Just hang on!”**

The familiar voice sounds agitated but the last thing Sherlock sees before he loses the battle to stay awake is John, sitting in his chair, exactly where he should be, watching him fondly as he calmly sips his tea.


	2. Sanctuary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 'He’s going mad, isn’t he? Reality is clearly running through his fingers like sand through a timer.'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has read the opener of this story. I'm very humbled by the reception it's getting. 
> 
> Hoping to post these chapters out every couple of days as they're ready.

**“Do you know where you are?”**

Some time has clearly passed; how long precisely is a mystery. The fire has burned down to the merest embers and the curtains are drawn. The light of a single floor lamp is insufficient to adequately illuminate the sitting room but it shines softly on John, perched on the coffee table at his side where Sherlock is stretched out on the sofa. Every so often a wave of vertigo rocks him, making him feel like he’s swaying or spinning. Logically, he understands that he’s lying down but it’s only John’s steadying hand on his shoulder that assures him that he’s in no danger of falling.

“Baker Street,” Sherlock mutters, but that’s not right, is it? “No! My mind palace.”

“Mind palace?” John echoes with an upward lilt denoting his puzzlement.

“Yes! Why are you here?” he snaps. This isn’t how it usually works. Sherlock hasn’t selected a memory or even asked a question. Why is John engaging him without specific input or purpose?

“Don’t ask me. It’s your filing system, not mine,” John retorts without any real heat. His gaze is warm and unusually direct. His hand lingers on Sherlock’s shoulder then strokes down his arm.

Sherlock frowns and closes his eyes. John really shouldn’t be here – it isn’t a case of him not being welcome in his mind palace, but that he is interacting independently. That should not happen. The method of loci is a system whereby he stores information and memories, and while there is an embarrassing abundance of material associated with the good doctor here, Sherlock has never experienced another personality inside his palace acting independently of his own data on that person. John shouldn’t be here because to be here he must be extrapolated from Sherlock’s stored memories of him, and this content – what he is saying and doing – these are all new. These are not phrases that Sherlock has heard him say, but they give him the appearance, at least, of independent thought. It’s very strange, and it should be unnerving; is he _ imagining _ how John would reply to a comment or react to a situation and imbuing this illusory John with those calculated predictions? 

Shouldn’t he _ know  _ if he were doing that?

He opens his eyes to take another, closer look at John but there is an ugly flare of brilliant light… lightning? It’s almost painful and it forces him to shut them tightly, seeing after-images of yellow and green float across the darkness. A headache blooms with the swell of colours, pulsing with his heartbeat.

**“Sherlock?”**

John’s voice is tight and pitched low, just for him. It doesn’t fit his expression, his calm, relaxed demeanour.

**“If you can hear me, you just need to hang on for a few more minutes. We’re nearly there. Hang on, okay? Can you squeeze my hand?”**

John sounds like he’s talking over the noise of the water _ – yes, _ of course; it was  _ water _ – the higher tones in his voice lost in the hiss and wash of the all-devouring flood, leaving only the deeper, sustained timbre of his words. A sudden, harsh scent of chemicals offends his nose, drowning out the scent of John and Baker Street and the leather of the couch. It is iron and something astringent. It is copper and chlorine and combustion…

Panic pushes at the edges of his consciousness so Sherlock touches his palms together, matching fingertip to fingertip and bringing them to his chin in a familiar gesture – an attempt to calm himself so he can review the evidence thus far. He never stays in the palace unless he knows he can do so safely or needs a retreat from distraction, discomfort or anxiety. Which is it this time? Is this avatar of John a guardian or a herald of hardship to come?

This John is mostly talking out of context but not all the time. He seems to respond to Sherlock’s questions when they are voiced, but his own independent utterances continue to be quite random and markedly at odds with his calm demeanour and the situation. Sherlock needs more data.

“John, are you still here?”

He doesn’t risk opening his eyes again. The vertigo is lessening, but he’s cold and there’s a threatening nausea that rolls, slick and icy in his stomach.

A hand squeezes his shoulder, heat radiating from that simple gesture in a soft, safe wave and Sherlock breathes a little more easily.

“I’m here. Where else would I be? Are you okay?” John’s calm voice compounds the warmth beginning to trickle through Sherlock’s veins.

“I’m not certain,” he admits. It’s a massive understatement but Sherlock doesn’t currently have words to encompass the void where rationality should be.

“Maybe you’re coming down with something. I’ll get my bag,” John says and moves away. Sherlock attempts to hang on to the sensation of John’s touch to avoid the drift he can’t feel, but knows is happening.

So… if these aren’t memories and Sherlock isn’t extrapolating, then is this really his mind palace at all? Perhaps John has the right idea – what if his higher functions are impaired by some lowly, single-celled assassin and an infection is spreading through his bloodstream, rendering him delusional? Maybe he’s hallucinating this entire scenario. Shouldn’t he be registering other symptoms though, shouldn’t he have had some inkling that he was unwell instead of just this confounding dive down the rabbit hole that he’s currently experiencing.

He becomes aware of John’s voice spilling from the kitchen. He’s been known to mutter to himself when Sherlock has been particularly trying, but this is not that. John is talking in quiet but urgent rhythms, his voice tracing up and down. There are other voices too, equally clipped and intense. He must have dropped off because he didn’t hear anyone else come in. It’s worrying enough that he has managed to conjure a John Watson with whom to populate this impaired mind palace, but other people in here really are out of the question and need to be banished.

“John! Who else is here?” he demands.

“No one else.” John’s voice is coming closer again. Only one set of footsteps. “Just the two of us against the world, right?”

Sherlock feels disconnected in a way that makes tendrils of unfocussed fear steal further through him, but he’s soothed once more by John’s hands on him, calm and assessing; a cool palm on his forehead, fingertips at his pulse and feeling for the glands in his neck.

“I’ll draw some blood and get the clinic to fast track the results. Better to be sure.”

A tourniquet slips around Sherlock’s bicep and tightens before John slaps his forearm a few times. “Sorry, just a sharp pinch now,” he narrates, his voice oddly distant like a radio signal losing its frequency.

**“GCS 11, can’t tell if it’s staying that way or if he’s getting more confused.”**

Sherlock opens his mouth to protest, but grimaces instead as the needle slides into his flesh, his body reluctant to give up the required sample, but John clearly wins this round as he directs Sherlock to hold a bit of gauze against the crimson trickling puncture once he has his required vials filled. 

“They always complain that I’m a difficult stick,” Sherlock mutters.

“They don’t know what they’re doing, then, unlike me,” John declares. He sounds more present now. Calm and capable.

A muffled chime in Sherlock’s ear has John drawing in a puzzled breath. 

“You’re not hot.”

John doesn’t normally let an opening for a terrible joke like that go by and Sherlock cautiously opens his eyes. Thankfully, the lightning seems to be over. John is kneeling on the floor in front of him.

Sherlock looks down to assess the flow of blood but there’s no puncture now, no gauze, only his pale forearm and the sleeve of his second favourite dressing gown. The world slips from his grasp a little more.

John pats Sherlock’s thigh and uses it to help push himself up to standing. With a quick smile, he bends down to brush a kiss against Sherlock’s forehead. The gesture seems completely natural, as if this is something they do every day.

“I’ll make some tea, shall I?”

Sherlock cannot have drunk the last cup yet and why on Earth is John discussing tea when he has just done something so utterly game-changing? When Sherlock doesn’t reply, John potters off into the kitchen and the reassuring clink of mugs and spoons begins. Sherlock allows it to wash over him while he tries to untangle his thoughts about the kiss. Something seemingly normal and familiar to John and something totally unprecedented to Sherlock.

He’s going mad, isn’t he? Reality is clearly running through his fingers like sand through a timer.

**“He needs a CT; the gash can wait since it’s not even bleeding anymore. Sherlock? You still with me?”**

John seems to be talking to his friends in the kitchen again; perhaps only Sherlock can discern the effort John is having to put into keeping his voice firm and concise. He can’t quite hear the exact words, only the overall tone of the conversation. Irritated, he levers himself up from the sofa and stands gingerly, waiting for the tug of residual vertigo to recede before he slowly makes his way to the kitchen, a hand on the furniture or walls all the way.

More unfamiliar voices now, distant as though heard through a door: 

**“Take a deep breath and hold it while we count to five. Mr Holmes? Mr Holmes, are you listening? Hold the contrast dye and go check on him.”**

**“BP’s gone haywire and there’s arrhythmia.”**

It’s John’s voice again, angry in that very specific tone he uses to conceal nervousness. But why would he need to be nervous?

Sherlock needs to get into the kitchen, but there’s a pressure in his head again, worse than before. Leaning his shoulder against the wall, he manages to round the corner into the kitchen. John… there is only John… who looks up as Sherlock drags himself in. He’s dressed for the weekend in a long-sleeved t-shirt and jeans, his neat, pale feet bare on the kitchen lino. He puts down his marmalade toast.

“Morning, Sherlock. Did you sleep okay?”

Sherlock blinks at him.

“I think you were having nightmares. Half the night I was getting shoved off the bed and the other half I was boiling hot because you were draped all over me.”

He smiles in the way that always used to end in him clearing his throat and looking away, checking to see who has seen them. Not today though; today John’s smile is beaming, open and affectionate. The vicinity goes unchecked.

The sun shines in through the tiny window, making their kitchen look garishly cheerful through the smears on the glass.

This isn’t his life. John isn’t  _ his _ , not like this.

And that’s how Sherlock knows something is terribly, critically wrong.

>>>>><<<<<

With the doors shut firmly and the curtains drawn, Sherlock can breathe more easily. He’s been sitting here, palms together and fingers pressed against his lips for some time, but the struggle to make a pattern out of all the conflicting data in his head is fruitless and he’s spent more time floating off into the shallower waters of what-ifs and surprise kisses than he’s spent trying to wrangle the strange facts of his current predicament into some sense. He has decided it’s safer to remain sitting rather than pacing around; the floor feels uneven, the walls keep changing their distance although it all looks deceptively normal. Outside, somewhere, a storm is brewing but here, in the cocoon of their home, this sanctuary in the confines of his mind, he’s safe. _ They _ are safe. For now.

**“He needs that craniotomy right now. Call upstairs and arrange––”**

Upstairs? John sleeps upstairs, doesn’t he? How could Sherlock have kicked him out of bed if––

**“– need an ITU bed for a traumatic epidural bleed we’re taking in for––”**

John both looks and sounds calm to the point of it being suspicious as he puts the biscuit tin back in the kitchen. He seems unruffled or unaware of the way time is jumping; the minutes becoming hours and the hours becoming nothing as Sherlock is repeatedly thrown out of his present and cast forward into another, seemingly at random. John also seems to have missed the fact that there are disembodied voices muttering just out of hearing and strange scents that come out of nowhere and disappear just as mysteriously. Mint. Soap. Disinfectant. Sweat. Coppery blood. The dry, subtle scent of pulverised bone very few people recognise. Sherlock does. He makes it his business to know such things but in his work, those things have  _ context _ .

He doesn’t remember John closing the curtains, doesn’t recall the afternoon fading into evening or spring fading into autumn, but here in their cramped, familiar sitting room, Sherlock feels protected, although from what, he has no idea. He feels as though the world is ending just outside the windows of their flat, but as long as the curtains remain drawn, they can pretend everything is fine.

“Have you checked your emails?” John asks quietly over the tick of the clock and the lazy hiss of the burning coals.

“What for?” 

“You need a case before you start shooting walls again,” John says and Sherlock can hear the shape of John’s lips and the smirk in his voice as he speaks.

Sherlock knows without checking that there are no emails, that his phone doesn’t have signal and that no papers arrived today. He’s not even going to acknowledge the wall comment. Mrs Hudson had been tiresomely vocal about the damage to the wallpaper.

“I’m fine,” he murmurs. “Thinking.”

“Well, I’m popping out to get some milk. Mrs Hudson is getting sick of us stealing hers. Is there anything else you want?” John’s hand lands on his shoulder and kneads lightly for a moment. Instead of the usual awkward retreat, he lingers, his fingers brushing the skin of Sherlock’s neck in a caress, then carding through Sherlock’s hair, leaving it in deliberate disarray. 

It’s a huge effort, but Sherlock ignores him and tries to snag the last shreds of his thoughts as they cycle through his head aimlessly. There was something about this room, something about safety and a refuge from…

The pressure in his head is increasing beyond that which he can ignore again, and he feels faint, drained and weak.

There’s no traffic noise from the street now. All he hears are voices, distant but distinct, and there’s a prickling sensation in his head like static electricity. He feels hands touching his scalp, but there’s nobody there.

Suddenly there is a sinking, burning pressure on his forehead. He claws at it but finds nothing other than handfuls of his own hair. Another lance of pain strikes, pressing and twisting, creating a band of heavy compression.

**“Heart rate’s hitting the high 160s; increasing the Ultiva target. I don’t like the look of that BIS reading.”**

**“That doctor who was with him said he might have some tolerance. The Rapifen he got in the ambulance did ‘fuck all’ – that’s a direct quote.”**

_ John  _ is a doctor known to indulge in such profanities. Is that who they mean? Sherlock’s head swivels around to see who else is in the flat, but he is still alone and the voices fall quiet. Perhaps John is in another room, although he said he was going to… where?

“John! Wait!'' Sherlock shouts, his brain suddenly catching up with recent input. John must not open the sitting room door because of what lies outside. The danger which brought him here, perhaps even made him drag his version of John in with him if the palace is under siege. The… the…

Sherlock shakes his head in frustration but the pain keeps growing, tightening the invisible band around his skull. Nauseated, he leaps from his chair to stop John from letting whatever it is out there in here with them.

But John isn’t here. How can he not be here when Sherlock can still sense the heat in the shoulder he touched?

The pressure around his skull stops suddenly, making him feel like he’s missed the final step of a staircase in the dark. An odd sensation of lightness takes over, and there’s an alarming familiarity to the seconds after emptying a syringe into his veins, that blissful moment of disconnection from the rest of the world, the universe lifting him above such irrelevance. 

Relishing the relief from pain, he cautiously approaches the sitting room door. He lays a hand against the dusty wood grain, but there are no vibrations, just warm, smooth panels. Very carefully he presses an ear to the door and listens. Any sounds coming from outside are too muffled and distant to be detected.

Sherlock grasps the door handle, but a flood of half-remembered sensations, too fast to identify, leave him with a suffocating feeling of dread, icy sweat breaking out on his back and a nausea that sours his mouth with the taste of bile. He snatches his hand back, growling in frustration and forces himself to stagger the few steps to the door that leads from the kitchen onto the same landing.

Again he pauses, listening and waiting. There is no warning this time. An overwhelming lassitude washes over him and nearly makes his knees buckle, unfastening muscles that have been locked for too long. Before he’s aware he’s doing it, Sherlock has turned the knob and opened the door, and instead of the dark, narrow hallway he’s staring into a garden. It takes him several seconds to understand that this isn’t just  _ a  _ garden; it is, without a doubt,  _ his _ garden. More accurately, it is the potential garden in Sussex which exists only in his most private thoughts – a half-imagined notion he had once concocted in a weak moment, a better future than he could see after John had walked out on him to sleep on Sarah Sawyer’s sofa. To see it rendered here, nuanced even beyond the level of detail he’d imagined that day is jarring. It is not a place for the present; it is an idea, an idle thought that crossed his mind and took hold as an exercise in unlikely possibilities. 

The drone of bees underpins the birdsong; hives are busy with the comings and goings of his colonies. Somewhere in the distance a gull shrieks, speaking of the coast although it isn’t visible from here. There’s an orchard, lawns and a cottage made of flint and old, red brick that sits among flower beds filled with blowsy roses and lavender. There are benches in the sun and in the shade for them to retire to through the day, each thoughtfully placed to enjoy some aspect of the planting or the view or the weather, but always with enough room for two. Under a venerable cedar tree, a young setter wags his tail in lazy welcome, disturbing a dozing terrier beside him from his nap. Always two. Alone may protect Sherlock, but alone is not what he wants, and this is something he’ll only ever admit to himself during his weaker moments.

Sherlock knows that the grass will be cool and refreshingly damp under his bare feet. He knows that the scent of the roses will carry to where he is here, especially in the evenings, and that if he walks to the end of the orchard, in a dip between the Downs where the river cuts through, he will be able to glimpse the sea. He knows that his book is by his chair in the sitting room and that their coats hang on pegs in the hall above a line of wellington boots and shoes, and that the dog leads are in the dresser drawer by the front door. He knows that he is truly happy in this home that is a mixture of truths and hopes that exists only in the sweetest, most indulgent of his imaginings. He also knows that it is not the bees or the bricks or the apple trees which turn this place into a home – it is a presence, one he’d thought he’d lost the day when he had dreamt up this haven.

He doesn’t want to leave. Something in him is heavy and uncaring. It pulls him under and unlike sleep, he cannot force it to recede even for a moment.


	3. The Inescapable Conclusion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two chapters today as they were both short and quick to tidy up. B xxx

He doesn’t know how long he stands and breathes in the palpable peace of the garden and lets it fill him. 

Unfortunately, even this safest of places has been infiltrated.

**“ICP’s climbing. We’ll go back on the propofol and let them try again at the––”**

Sherlock startles; he stumbles back and into the kitchen, the present intruding on the impossibility before him. 

Gone are the smells of freshly cut grass and roses along with the background hum of bees. Instead, nonsense and static now assault him. It sounds as if it’s coming through the walls, or perhaps echoed from deep in the earth through the plumbing. Sherlock peers towards the sink, wondering if he is losing his grip on reality altogether.

John is at the desk in the sitting room, tapping away at his laptop with his tongue between his teeth as he concentrates. The buffalo skull has fairy lights wrapped around its horns and they streak dreadful, clashing colours through John’s hair. John and Mrs Hudson think that such things are ‘festive’ but Sherlock insists that they are gaudy and vulgar. Their landlady has been encouraging John in so-called ‘decorating’ for Christmas; hints of her handiwork are in the hideous knitted snowmen and moth-eaten robins which seem to have appeared on every available surface. There’s a glass of wine on the table beside John’s chair and a plate with a half-eaten mince pie which would explain the scent of baking that now pervades the flat.

A creeping sensation of helplessness settles in Sherlock’s chest and he covers his face with his hands, just for a moment. He drops into John’s chair seeking comfort in the form that John leaves in the cushions.

Nothing is right. 

There’s no sense of the passage of time, there is no pattern to John’s random arrivals and departures. It’s no use being aware that something terrible is happening; with all the laws of science abandoned in this current reality, he cannot trust what his eyes see, what his ears hear. It’s like time itself has become porous and fragile, with multiple realities intruding randomly on his consciousness. For a man like Sherlock, who has built his life about certain constants and who has eschewed all but the most rigorously tested and proven concepts, this is more terrifying than he can process. Although John’s appearance in his mind palace is unprecedented and as yet unexplained, Sherlock cannot deny that even the idea of him being present brings him the only comfort available to him in this endlessly confusing space.

“Why am I here?” he asks. He’s tired and the question is semi-rhetorical.

“Why do _you_ think you’re here?” John counters, his mouth mostly obscured by the fingers of the palm he has propped his chin on, only half his attention on Sherlock’s plaintive question. “You’re the cleverest man in London. _Solve it_.”

Sherlock gives John a rapid once over with a narrowed gaze. There are no game-changing insights, no evasions or sudden changes in his appearance or behaviours. No tricks to uncover. No breakthrough to make. This John knows no more than Sherlock does.

“You’re being uncharacteristically unhelpful,” he complains.

“Yeah, I know how that feels,” John laughs, sitting back from the screen and actually looking at him this time.

“If this is my mind palace, then why can’t I leave?”

John looks around, as if evaluating options and shrugs. “Have you really given it a proper try?”

Sherlock rises and walks carefully towards the door. The sense of _wrongness_ of what lies behind it becomes stronger with every step until it is a shrieking, dragging dissonance along his every nerve and a suffocating lack of breath.

**“We’ll try a sedation break if his ICP stays below fifteen through the night and if there are no more seizures.”**

A warm, sweaty palm alights on his arm. The sensory information is incontrovertible – it cannot be anything else, yet he cannot see the hand. Sherlock raises his arm and looks, _really_ looks at his limb, examines the familiar contours of his bare skin, and sees nothing. The touch evaporates as fast as it appeared, but he had recognised it. 

It had been familiar, and somehow, more corporeal, more real than anything he’s seen or felt in this place.

 _John._ He knows the touch of those strong hands so well since he has committed to memory every instance of it.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” comes a chuckle from the other side of the room. John is still there, waiting for Sherlock’s explanation with patience and interest.

“It’s not…not...good,” Sherlock mutters feebly, his words slurred and difficult to find. They don’t even feel like his words in his mouth. He hates this lack of vocabulary to explain the baseless but very present feelings of dread that assail him each time he approaches this doorway. 

**“Hear that? You just need a bit of rest.”** John’s voice, coming from through the door, is urgent, breaking a bit. He sounds like he’s lying in that doctorly, placating manner Sherlock has heard from numerous healthcare professionals through his life. He loathes it, especially when John uses it on him. 

**“I’ll be right here.”**

Now this, this is not a lie. This, John means.

**“Dr Watson, I really think you should get that arm looked at.”**

**“Feel free to send someone up here. I’m not leaving this room.”**

Sherlock glances over to find John watching him with a most conflicted expression on his face. It’s an interesting reaction that suggests to Sherlock that the doctor, imaginary or not, is beginning to have serious misgivings about the state of Sherlock’s sanity. That makes two of them.

“Is... is... your arm...” Sherlock tries, and John frowns at him. There are words floating in Sherlock’s head and they sink whenever he tries to reach for them. Flotsam and jetsam on the surface of his intelligence. Usually, when he’s thinking hard, words ricochet and he chases after them, his neurons firing too rapidly for his verbal centres to keep up. Now, it’s the opposite. His thoughts are sluggish and incomplete, and words non-existent, slipping through his grip and if he manages to entrap them, they’re the wrong ones.

John had said that he wasn’t leaving this room, but he needs to come with Sherlock. They need to at least try to escape. They can’t stay here; something is trying to trap them in here. Clearly the danger is palpable only to himself, and he does not know how to make John understand the certainty of his beliefs. 

Sherlock returns his attention to the commonplace door that separates them from the landing, or whatever has taken its place. He has walked through this door hundreds of times, both in his mind and in Baker Street without thought and without incident, so why is he certain that to step through it now will be a terrible mistake?

“There’s another door.” He gestures towards the kitchen and the entryway to the inexplicable appearance of his highly improbable ideas and plans for their future. “It’s… I’ve never been there. In fact, it may not even exist. It’s not part of my mind palace and I don’t fully understand how it has been able to create itself here. You must know how this works, John; I have explained it to you before. If I haven’t consciously recreated it and assigned meaning to each of the elements therein, then why is it here? _How_ is it here?”

John turns away from the desk and he shakes his head slowly. “I don’t know, but you’re starting to worry me. Maybe whatever that…thing you just described is your subconscious trying to tell you something? You can’t stay cooped up in the flat forever, love. 

Sherlock blinks, his heart stutters and he’s reluctant to realise that all the romantic drivel about physical responses to such terms of endearment, those which he’s disregarded so scornfully, have a basis in fact. He closes his eyes for a moment to appreciate John’s words before he has to attempt to apply logic and reality and experience to this latest exchange.

John has insipid girlfriends. John shouts when Sherlock leaves experiments too near to food in the fridge. John is offended when idiots assume they are together. John is _not gay_.

However, John makes him tea and terrible dinners. John licks his lips and lets his own gaze linger on Sherlock’s mouth when they talk. John doesn’t step away when Sherlock stands too close. John calls him _brilliant_ and _amazing_ and _incredible_.

But John doesn’t call him ‘love.’

Not once.

John doesn’t call him ‘love’ and John doesn’t kiss his forehead nor ruffle his hair nor direct any banalities of affection in Sherlock’s direction.

Since that first clumsy pass made at the restaurant while they were working on the serial poisoner case, they have established a mutually beneficial rapport and Sherlock is more brilliant and productive than ever. John is attractive, competent, interesting and is vital to his work. He has useful skills and a personality that is complementary to his own. But Sherlock has never stopped to consider whether a physical element to their relationship would be something he might want. Now he appears to be trapped here with no other visible variables of interest than John Watson, he has had time to expend some mental energy on the question.

The inescapable conclusion is that the person he is conversing with is certainly not not the John Watson from Sherlock’s reality, not the real John with his conflicts and demons and his predictable quips and his sarcasm and his veneer of sociability. No, this is a John Watson that Sherlock has, for some reason, fabricated himself. A John that has resolved all his contradictions and uncertainties. A John that, however inexplicably, would appear to love him openly.

Something like desperation rises into his throat and Sherlock has to swallow hard to keep it there and not give it voice. Everything about this is wrong; even if his head were working properly he wouldn’t be able to untangle the wasteland that his mind palace has become because the rule of logic and scientific method no longer applies here. Wherever here is. This is everything he wants and it’s wrong, wrong, _wrong_ , but so is whatever is happening outside the confines of this non-existent place.

It’s intolerable. It’s an abomination. His mind is shattered; that which he has relied on as a refuge and an inexhaustible resource for so many years has dissolved into a chaos that he cannot even imagine the shape of. And what is worse, is that he has indulged his own unacknowledged desires by fleshing out in his mind the attraction which he has ignored for so long. His own predictability, the fact that he is suddenly at the mercy of all those qualities he has purported to deride, chokes him. His self-loathing seeks an outlet and when bitterness finds that pulling on his own hair doesn’t help, he spins towards the door, the _wrong_ door, crosses the room in three strides and throws it open.

There, all that exists is howling darkness and nausea and _pain._ It is a void in which his significance ceases, and his consciousness becomes an irrelevance. This place has no feature by which one might understand it. It lacks shape, hue, orientation, scent, atmosphere, temperature. It is nothingness.

It is terrifying beyond Sherlock’s comprehension of the word.

Only when he manages to slam the door shut does he understand that he has been shouting – shrieking, really, if the rawness of his throat is anything to go by. He fights to make his breathing even and to stop his heart from battering against his ribs like a bird against the bars of its cage.

John’s strong arms come around his shoulders and turn him away, leading him to the sofa where they sit and Sherlock, hating himself, allows John to stroke his back and pet his hair until the tears on his face have dried.

“You’re okay, love,” John tells him, his voice warm and soothing. “It’s okay, Sherlock. I’m here.”

“No, you’re not,” Sherlock replies in a whisper that John clearly pretends not to hear.

Maybe John prefers this place, too.


	4. Distraction

Sherlock wakes to the sound of a measured voice speaking a complex rhythm, soft and low. The words are hard to pick out, only every third one or so intelligible. The speaker isn’t formally trained; Sherlock can tell by the slight hesitations and the sensitive but unmodulated lilt to his retelling. Yes, exactly, retelling – the voice is reading to him. Male. Tired. Familiar with the intricacies of the text but with no recent review of the work. Hoarse through having read for too long.

A hissing much like the wash of waves on the shoreline is drowning the higher registers of the man’s words as if he’s reading against the sound of the sea. Perhaps a recording of some sort? There are other sounds, too, piercing, electronic ones. The hum of air-conditioning.

A short pause and a clearing of the throat. A creak of a chair as someone moves to a position more comfortable after a stretch of time immobile. And then the voice resumes, and Sherlock’s suspicion grows into certainty.

It is John’s voice.

John is reading to him. Not in the focussed, directive tones of the nonsensical, erratic phrases that keep filtering into his days. No, this voice is quiet, often hesitant and meant only for Sherlock.

He wants to open his eyes, but his lids are heavier than his resolve is strong. 

This isn’t the first time he’s been brought to the surface by John’s voice . He has heard him in the quiet moments before he sleeps, in the stillness of the sitting room when he is alone and the other John has gone wherever it is that he goes. Where Sherlock cannot follow him. He keeps his eyes tightly shut, not only to avoid the distraction of the John that is waiting for him in the sitting room, but also to focus on the words being spoken.

A story?

The cadence of his speech is oddly familiar, though to his knowledge, Sherlock has never heard John recite a single paragraph of such a book. John is university-educated, he can manage any level of text in his native language unless the vocabulary is very complicated and the contents unfamiliar – or, he is reciting something that makes him emotional.

This realisation brings on another in a rush; John is not reading a book – it’s his blog. John is reading about  _ them _ , about the cases and chases and deductions. His weary voice sings with it, soft and glowing with pride.

Sherlock holds his breath, willing himself to understand more but the words won’t resolve. The hiss and wash of water is ever present and the thump of his own heart is too loud to let him hear.

“How are you feeling now?” John asks, his voice full of nuance, pitched gently. Concerned. Apprehensive.  _ Real _ ?

Sherlock drags his lids open and is mostly relieved to see the ceiling of their sitting room. John is standing beside the sofa on which he has been sleeping. He’s not holding his phone or a laptop — had he been reciting his blog posts from memory?

With a quirk of a smile John sinks down to sit snug against Sherlock’s thigh, twisted to face him. He rests a palm on Sherlock’s belly, rubbing softly as he searches his face for an answer.

“I feel like I’m losing my mind,” Sherlock admits, surprised into naked candour by the touch of John’s hand which is distracting, deliciously warm and assured. Sherlock lets his eyelids slide closed again, the better to appreciate the sensation.

“It’s only been a day since you solved your last case,” John laughs. “You need to pace yourself. You need to...”

**“…just give yourself a bit of time, hm? There’s nothing here that you can’t beat.”** The voice wavers a bit. It’s distant, shaky, and grotesquely in contrast to the way John’s thumb is gently and confidently stroking his hip bone.

He blinks and studies John. He looks relaxed and well-rested, but other than that, he’s exactly as Sherlock last saw him, whenever and wherever that was. His hair is growing out a little and his razor needs a new blade. Sherlock reaches out a hand and John allows him to cup his jaw to experience the texture of his stubble. He tilts his head and hums, pushing his cheek into Sherlock’s palm, like a cat looking for attention.

“Maybe you just need distraction,” John ventures, his voice taking on a smoothed edge and a hint of a tease. His eyes are bright and sharp. He turns his head into Sherlock’s hand and nips at the flesh beneath his thumb, a sly grin on his face.

Sherlock’s whole body feels like it is beating in time with his heart. He has seen John flirt before with prospective sexual partners, but never so overtly or so assuredly and it’s never been directed at him. If John’s repressed potential attraction to Sherlock should sometimes rise to the fore, it is always wordless and expressed only through his eyes and the nervous lick of a lip or clench of a fist. To find himself so plainly the object of John’s desire is heady, exhilarating and unforeseen.

His eyes must betray him, as John smiles more broadly and wiggles, prods and pushes until he is lying on his side next to Sherlock on the too small sofa, their knees and feet tangled. His hand returns to Sherlock’s belly but his stroking has a languorous rhythm now. He pushes up Sherlock’s t-shirt and runs fingertips over the skin of his stomach and his nails, so, so gently up Sherlock’s flanks making him shiver as his skin rises into goose pimples.

Sherlock knows this is wrong – it doesn’t matter which of the half-baked scenarios his overloaded brain has postulated, he is abusing John Watson’s trust and friendship by allowing this to go any further. With the benefit of years of experience pushing away that part of himself, Sherlock has brutally suppressed all conscious thoughts in this vein, knowing that John does not consider himself attracted to men. Whether it is something he is aware of remains unresolved, but Sherlock suspects that John is beginning to understand that the way he behaves around Sherlock is not how he behaves around other men. This doesn’t imply that the attraction is sexual, of course, but Sherlock doesn’t have a great deal of experience when it comes to how closely platonic male friends behave in their interactions – his sample set is rather small and mostly consists of observing other male acquaintances with their colleagues – hardly a rigorous control set.

What is currently transpiring is a construct of Sherlock’s impeded mind; nothing more, and he fears that if he indulges too thoroughly in this, memories of it may intrude upon his interactions with the real John and betray his thoughts. He has drawn together daydreams and deductions and observational data to create this John, and although it isn’t intentional, it is still unethical to let this happen.

But…

If this isn’t real, then John is never going to know, is he? This would clearly come under the criteria of private fantasy or idle sexual thought, which is something that one cannot control. Sherlock has dreamed of John, his subconscious feasting on the man’s capable hands and strong shoulders, of the things John could do to him and he could do in return. Sherlock has woken from such dreams with arousal akin to a wildfire and erections which refused to abate until manually relieved. He has always dismissed these dreams as aberrations, a result of having adopted celibacy as a lifestyle and because he spends more time in John’s company than with anyone else. This must surely count as such an episode, a temporary lapse in judgement when his baser instincts take over. Sherlock has not deliberately manufactured this particular scene, nor sought to objectify John in this way. Yet he is self aware and lucid enough to know it’s wrong. At the very least, it’s deeply disrespectful. But, dear god, it is tempting and feels so wonderful. Arousal simmers like molten sunshine in his veins. Even if he had consciously sought to create such a fantasy as this, he would have failed to do it justice by a great deal.

John’s hand sweeps lower with each pass; his fingertips just skim along the waist of his pyjama bottoms, making Sherlock twitch with want. Propped up on one elbow, John gives him the sweetest smile, lowers his head and catches Sherlock’s lips with a soft, slightly knowing ‘hello’ of a kiss. It wouldn’t matter how many times they did this, Sherlock knows he would never get used to John’s kisses, never take them for granted or make them commonplace. 

John’s quiet words of praise, with the way he presses his lips to only the most sensitive spots on Sherlock’s neck and collarbone fill him with a need that he has rarely, if ever, experienced. And all the time the evidence of John’s own desire is pressing unsubtly into his hip.

Sherlock feels lightheaded with the rush of it. John is  _ hard for him _ . John  _ wants him _ . The arousal of being the object of such blatant, proud desire spikes and Sherlock is so filled with it that it begins to spill out of him in kisses and gasped breaths and long, low groans.

He has always considered himself above the trivialities of sexual attraction but if this had ever been a possibility – if Sherlock had known that it was – then he would have said something to initiate it. To have the weight of John Watson pressed against him, solid, muscled and wanting is better than he could ever have predicted. He longs to take what is so clearly on offer here. He’s literally losing his mind – the comfort such an intimate interlude with John would elicit might go a long way towards soothing him, but no, his stupid honour won’t allow this. He’s not a man often troubled by dilemmas of conscience and it would be so simple to let this act run its natural course, but an annoying albeit significant part of him is charting the guilt he would carry afterwards even if this is just a fantasy.

“You’re very quiet,” John murmurs against his ear. “Are you too lost inside your head or just not in the mood?”

He doesn’t sound angry or disappointed, only genuinely wanting to please. He sounds as though this has happened before – as though gauging whether Sherlock happens to be receptive to his advances or preoccupied with something else is a normal part of John’s life.

Sherlock turns his head to find John right there. The ancient leather sofa sighs as John slowly leans up to place a soft, sucking kiss against Sherlock’s lower lip.

Sherlock wants to pace this, wants to explore, wants to make sure he remembers every detail. It appears that, despite the spluttering protests of his moral core, a deeper part of him has made up his mind that he needs this more than he needs to avoid adding to his many regrets in life.

“John, can we just… could we just kiss? Like this?”

The smile that breaks across John’s face is heartbreakingly genuine and happy. Even as he is watching it bloom now, Sherlock already longs for the next one.

“Yeah,” John breathes. “Yeah, we can do that.”

He rolls further into Sherlock, slotting a leg between Sherlock’s thighs, careful not to knee him in the balls. He then proceeds to kiss him to within an inch of his remaining sanity. The ache of lust becomes a thrum of want, persistent but easier to bear. Little things that John does inform Sherlock that, in this place, they have done this before, that they are intimate and familiar with each other’s bodies and with the other’s likes and dislikes. John knows the most sensitive places to kiss, the most exquisite grazes of teeth on his neck and how sinking his hands into Sherlock’s hair makes him go soft and pliant – and really, why wouldn’t he know these things? This is a John he has created himself. This is Sherlock making love to himself. He only hopes that faux John is as satisfied with Sherlock’s attempts at returning these touches. It’s strange that as a figment of his imagination, this John seems to have a mind of his own and immense capacity for surprising his creator.

They kiss as if this is a conversation with a back and forth, with intensity and persuasion, and then with teasing and whimsy. Each time Sherlock is sure they must have run out of things to say with their lips, it begins again – a new emotion to express, a new point to be made. John’s tongue sips at him, soft and knowledgeable, and Sherlock follows, daring more than he might otherwise have done, to encourage John to linger and savour, to take him to the very edge of what his now primed nerve endings can tolerate without being overwhelmed.

Lips swollen and stinging, they rest their foreheads together and breathe. Sherlock is unwilling to release John from his arms and can’t help stealing yet more kisses, which makes John smile. They doze and cuddle, their heartbeats slowly synch up and Sherlock learns a contentment that he has rarely even considered. He had never thought that sharing a sofa with John in such a manner could be so profound and moving.

John’s head on his shoulder becomes heavier, and he mumbles a soft, “Love you.”

Sherlock doesn’t return the phrase, although he wants to, desperately. These are words he’s never said to anyone, and he won’t spill them now in such a careless manner when they have no real recipient. Instead he waits until John’s soft breaths deepen in sleep, and he counts the lights of cars passing on the street below as they track across the ceiling, holding him as tight and close as he dares.

When John stirs some nebulous amount of time later, and mutters about being too heavy and about his shoulder not forgiving him, Sherlock is still counting.

“You coming to bed yet?” John husks, his voice still groggy from sleep.

“Not just yet.”

“Don’t stay up too long,” John tells him, yawns and presses a kiss to his brow.

As soon as John shuffles from the room, Sherlock rises, pulls the blanket from John’s chair and walks to the kitchen. He pulls the door open and lets the sweetness of the night air rush across him.

The moon is low in the sky and tattered shreds of cloud obscure its glow intermittently. The grass in the garden looks like velvet in the darkness and the scent of honeysuckle and stocks is almost overpowering.

Sherlock sinks down in the doorway just as the first of the finches begin to fuss and chatter. The sky hasn’t even begun to hint at sunrise yet but soon a blackbird has joined the chorus, his song sweet and chiming, carrying clear above the ripple of other voices.

Slowly the sky begins to lighten, grey to peach to pink and fragile blue, the clouds catching every shade as the sun finally touches the horizon. A cockerel announces the day from some distance away and the sounds of the waking world start to intrude.

A sudden click and the squeak of a door capture Sherlock’s attention. The backdoor of the cottage opens a fraction and a leggy dog explodes from the gap which surely cannot be wide enough to have let him pass through. He is followed at a more sedate pace by the terrier but Sherlock can’t look away from the man who stands in the doorway, mug of tea in hand, leaning on the door jamb and watching the dogs do their circuit of the garden with every evidence of happiness.

John Watson has aged well, Sherlock thinks. His hair is all grey now, cut quite short. The same grey is in his beard but some dark blonde remains. He’s in a t-shirt and shorts, some form of pyjamas Sherlock assumes, and he can see that John has still retained his strong thighs and sturdy compact frame. The lines on his face are the work of a lifetime, but he looks content now. Easy. As if he is where and who he is meant to be.

John turns then, his head cocked and Sherlock experiences another flush of vertigo as he recognises the rumble and stridency of his own voice calling from inside the chocolate-box cottage.

“Coming!” John calls, then mutters something about a ‘berk’ that Sherlock cannot hear clearly, disappearing into the house again, leaving the door propped open.

The desire to get up and follow John is a physical sensation, lodged like a hook behind his heart. He longs to see their life here together. He wants to see how John looks at his older self – wants to see how he does so in return. He wants to measure the years between here and there, break them down and use them as a guide. He wants to see how they fill their days and nights, wants to make the connections that join him now to him then.

**“You hear me, Sherlock? You can stop this, now. I need you to wake up.”**

“I am awake,” he protests. “I’ve been awake all night because I don’t want to miss a single moment. I’m awake, John. I am. More awake than I have been since I met you.” 

The last words are a whisper, drowned out by the sound of the early morning wind in the trees.


	5. The Choice To Be Made

The next time Sherlock is aware of anything, he’s disappointed to find himself standing in their sitting room. It appears this is where he always ends up, like a counter on a game board having to go back to the beginning as a penalty.

Sherlock knows that frustration cannot but further decrease his ability to think his way through the insane abbreviated existence he is currently experiencing, but knowing it and acting upon it are two different things. It’s entirely possible that he has been in here for weeks since he has lost all sense of time. It’s almost as if this environment is adjusting to his thought processes; each inkling or glimmer of order that Sherlock observes is instantly dashed away in a manner that seems calculated. He knows where he is, he just doesn’t know _when,_ and the way time slides and folds around him is making that feel unachievable. No newspapers, no emails, no TV – nothing that can pin down a date.

Looking around the flat, he sees the detritus of their combined lives, the things that he would look for when investigating a case, the items that would give the occupants away. There is nothing new here, nothing that he can point to and say ‘this is relevant.’ 

Eyes moving lazily over the familiar items in their cluttered rooms, he catches sight of an object beneath John’s chair – an aerosol can – the paint used in the Jade Pin case which had landed John with a court date and a consequent ASBO. Hardly daring to breathe, Sherlock stands and sharpens his gaze, knowing all at once what he is looking for. The most recent addition to their combined belongings will give him a _terminus ante quem_ – a date before which it cannot be. The paint is his starting point and, turning a full circle, he discards anything that comes from that case or before - riding crop by his music stand, scuffs on the floorboards from the pink suitcase, London A-Z left on top of shelved books, a yellow smiley face on the wall and the lucky cat. He looks for what came later – eczema ointment tubes on top of the fridge, a business card from Janus Cars in the mirror frame, chopsticks from the place that did the good black bean sauce, tea stain on carpet from an unfortunate breakfast situation, head shots of Connie Prince on top of John’s CV pushed to the corner of the desk, bullet holes in Mrs Hudson’s wall and an astronomy journal brought back from the security guard’s flat.

Sherlock blinks. The revelation is shocking in its simplicity and profound in its meaning: their flat here is exactly as it is right now in the world outside his mind palace. There are no extraneous items that have been accumulated, nothing that he doesn’t recognise and this evidence suggests that there is no difference between the two places other than the fact that here, he and John are lovers.

He has stilled, utterly wrong-footed by this revelation. 

Is it possible? Could he have had the cases and the near-misses and the companionship _and_ John’s love? Could John have loved him despite his single-mindedness and his obsessive drive to solve the cases that Lestrade brought him? Was there even space for a relationship in the way Sherlock led his life? The evidence of this room rather suggested there was – or that he thought there was. It appears he has filed away that love like any simple, concrete fact of their shared life.

He looks around for John to share this hypothesis, only then remembering that he is at work – Sherlock recalls a sick feeling of dread as he’d left the room. He’s debating how to exploit this new information when the damn persistent voices begin again. Sherlock approaches the sitting room door with unsteady hands and his stomach clenching in anxiety. It doesn’t seem to matter how many times he tells himself that his fears are baseless; he cannot control them whenever he imagines himself stepping through this mundane, familiar door.

There _is_ a second difference between this and reality, after all — the intruders.Their voices come and go; sometimes perfectly familiar and others just a teasing whisper, barely audible, let alone recognisable. Perhaps they are designed to distract him from his theorising. Perhaps he has been being played all along. If this John isn’t real, does that make the voices more or less likely to be a figment of his imagination? If this is psychosis, if his fractured mind is speaking to itself, should he be as aware of these discrepancies as he seems to be?

**“We’ll try another sedation break today, see how he does. The ICP bolt’s coming out today, so at least there's some good news.”**

He hears the words, but there is no sense behind them; he feels that he should know what they mean, but he cannot access the necessary memories. He presses his fingers against his mouth and feels them tremble, hating the frailty that betrays but understanding that this is unlike any experience he has endured before and his illusions of control are simply that – illusions.

Around and around and around he goes. 

There are no answers; only endless questions. And he’s deeply, utterly exhausted by it.

Sherlock picks up a discarded mug, cupping it thoughtfully in his palm before he pitches it with all his might at the wall. It shatters satisfyingly, the dregs of the coffee describing a perfectly fan-shaped pattern across the wallpaper.

With sudden intent, Sherlock goes to the kitchen and grabs the teapot and one of Mrs Hudson’s ceramic casserole dishes. He stands in the centre of the sitting room and hefts one, then the other. Dropping the teapot on the chair, Sherlock swings his arm, building up momentum, then at the perfect moment, just before the top of the arc, he releases the dish at the window.

There is an almighty crash and pieces of the casserole bounce and skitter across the floor, spreading in all directions except the one Sherlock wanted. He leaps to the window and examines the pane of glass in detail but there is no damage, not so much as a scuff. 

Below him on the street a traffic warden is writing a ticket for a van bumped up on the kerb. A mother is pushing a sleeping toddler in a buggy, detouring around a cat that has chosen to complete its toilette in the middle of the pavement. Not one of them has reacted to the sudden crash of the ceramic against the glass.

He knows before he tries that the windows will not open, but that doesn’t stop him from scraping his hands as he wrestles with the ancient mechanism. 

Undeterred, he grabs the teapot from the chair and, stepping to the side of the window, he brings it round in a wide arc and closes his eyes as it impacts on the glass. He feels the percussive force move through his wrist and elbow and into his shoulder as the teapot shatters.

“Jesus Christ, Sherlock!” John yelps, clearly having arrived without Sherlock becoming aware of him, once again. He crosses the room in three strides and runs his hands over Sherlock’s unresisting frame, seeking out injuries or answers. 

“Are you all right?”

Sherlock stares at him – stares at this man who is more important to him than he could possibly have predicted when first he met him in the lab at Barts.

**“Mmmm––”**

With growing horror, Sherlock realises that this is his own voice, attempting to say something. His throat is sore, his lips dry, and something is constricting his windpipe, making him choke. He _knows_ John is with him, but can’t even say his name, just unintelligible sounds and splutters, and the feeling that he’s got a mouth full of seawater. Panic rises in him, always just below the surface as it is now, waiting for its next opportunity to rob him of reason.

The drowning sensation abates in an instant a moment later and he can breathe again. Relief floods over him. He’s home. He’s safe. He’s with his John. Sitting room. Skull. Broken china. John. _John_.

“I’m fine, John. I’m fine,” he mutters, his words crisp and precise again.

John must be able to hear the lack of conviction in Sherlock’s voice, the robotic quality of his response, but he doesn’t acknowledge it; just tells Sherlock to wait there while he finds him some slippers to protect him from the sharp debris on the floor.

Sherlock drops the handle of the teapot, all that is left of his latest experiment with his environment. He notices that the floor is now clear of ceramic shards and a manic-edged laugh rises to his lips. Like a man in a trance, he lurches back to the door between the landing and the sitting room, and sinks down against it.

The disembodied voices are back, sounding from just outside the door. One of them is John’s, and Sherlock presses his ear flat against the worn wood to listen.

The ambient sound which resembles waves or falling rain prevent him from being able to distinguish many of the words but he is certain that he is hearing John; not the John who said goodbye this morning and kissed the taste of tea and jam into Sherlock’s mouth as he left, but the real one. That John’s voice is warm and rounded and happy. And it’s not the John who is worried about him cutting his feet and cleaning up the mess Sherlock has just made… or not. That John’s voice is concerned and peevish.

The voice Sherlock can hear intermittently through the cursed door is spiky with anxiety, gravelled with weariness. It pleads and demands, coaxes and attempts a frustrated sort of comfort. 

It is the voice of a man who is losing hope.

A sudden, choking nausea rises and a pounding headache begins like a drum in the distance. Clenching his teeth together to prevent himself from vomiting, Sherlock pushes his ear harder against the wood, the better to hear.

**“…takes time to wean him off...”**

**“But shouldn't he, of all people, come out of it faster, not slower?”** ****

**_“_ ** **…triggering well, but gets too restless when...”**

Trying to make sense of it all is too exhausting, and Sherlock begins to drift along the sound of the words, not seeking to understand more deeply but content to let them slip across his consciousness.

He’s so very tired, and he’s about to close his eyes for a moment when John’s voice floats in again.

**_“…after … day after day._ **

**_… stuck, … breath nor motion”_ **

Sherlock rallies: he knows this, he recognises the verse surely.

**_“As idle as a painted ship_ **

**_Upon a painted ocean.”_ **

It’s Taylor-Coleridge; _The Rime of the Ancient Mariner_. Sherlock had been reading it last week and left the book open beside his chair. He’d been trying to distract himself from boredom with a poem he has loved since a child.

He turns his head and sees that the book is no longer there. Suddenly, there is a timeframe to all of this. With a shudder, Sherlock pulls himself away from the door, sucking in a breath he’d been delaying for too long. He crawls the few metres to the sofa and hoists himself onto the worn seat.

What does this mean? Is his mind so thoroughly scrambled that he is mixing up events and people, mistaking this inverted, corrupted mess for the truth? Is he missing some fundamental common denominator in this or is it truly as it seems; an unrelated, unconnected handful of memories, idle thoughts and random deductions that disguise themselves as the present, the product of his failing mind? And if so, what are the scraps of other conversations? Who else could have access to this place?

Now he knows what he is listening to, he begins to fill in the words when the beating of his heart and the waves overwhelm John’s narration. He feels closer to those words now, more removed from the safety of the sitting room and edging toward wherever John is reading to him. As long as he clings to that voice, he’ll be alright. It’s not time to go yet. He can linger here, between these two worlds, for some time more.

**_“The many men, so beautiful!_ **

**_And they all dead did lie:_ **

**_And a thousand thousand slimy things_ **

**_Lived on; And so did I.”_ **

He falls asleep to the sound of John talking of a ship, the moon and a wedding guest.

>>>>><<<<<

The kitchen counter has been cleared of his equipment and is currently home to several knives, two chicken breasts, some frozen peas and a chopping board. 

John is cooking. 

This, in itself, is unremarkable but Sherlock has never been able to indulge himself in his current activity before, which is to openly stare at his flatmate _whilst_ cooking. John has caught his eye a couple of times and given him a grin or a wink, or raised his eyebrows in question, but he seems unruffled by the attention – if anything, he seems to be pleased by Sherlock’s unsubtle regard.

Sherlock appreciates the way John moves at the best of times, all solid stance and marching gait, but here in their private space, he particularly enjoys watching John complete the most mundane tasks with his neat, economical movements and easy confidence. There is no pretence in John, no artifice. He is a man completely comfortable in who he is unless someone deliberately challenges his identity. Sherlock has always admired this about him and more than once he has marvelled that, despite his own superior intellect and the advantages of a more privileged childhood, it is he who dresses with such meticulous care, who swings between euphoria and boredom and finds his worth in the praise of others, not John.

For a man who has been trapped inside one room for as long as Sherlock thinks he has been, John has been the single variable and, as such, has become the most interesting and vital thing in Sherlock’s life. The John outside these four walls is already his closest friend, a confidante, an aberration in a history of people who have endured him or valued his mind while rejecting his oddness, or, worst of all, pitied him. For this reason, John is already hugely important to Sherlock’s work and fascinating to him on a personal level. But it’s as if he has never _seen_ John Watson before – never stopped to look beyond his deductions about the man and understand what they mean. Sherlock has been observing John for some time now and has an excellent and extensive list of John’s physical characteristics down to and including the chicken pox scar he has on his left ankle, but the mental landscape of the man remains largely unexplored.

The radio is playing something dreadful and John taps the tip of the knife blade in time against the cutting board while he waits for a pan to heat. When the chorus comes around, John begins to sing along softly, his body rocking slightly as his weight shifts to the beat.

Sherlock wants to feel that movement. He wants to go over there and put his palms on John’s waist, press his chest against John’s back and feel the way the muscles of his torso shift. He wants to chase the vibrations of John’s voice by pressing his mouth to the nape of John’s neck, softly to let the skin move beneath his lips. Despite the intimacy of his thoughts, they aren’t even sexual necessarily. John has inadvertently become such an intrinsic part of Sherlock’s life that he cannot tolerate to have even the most miniscule detail about him to be unknown or untested. It has always taken a considerable amount of restraint on Sherlock’s part to allow John such secrets as these, where his deductions are hampered by not knowing which questions to ask. Where was John when he first heard this particular song? Who taught him to chop onions this way? Does he like to dance only in the privacy of their kitchen or might he be persuaded to dance elsewhere? These are not the kinds of things they have talked about. Would John have answered if Sherlock had found the right combination of words to ask?

And then Sherlock reminds himself that these questions are all pointless, as the John Watson dancing in their kitchen isn’t actually real but a facsimile, a projection. He doesn’t exist in this form in the world outside his mind palace. 

“Taste,” John demands, brandishing a wooden spoon, and it’s an expression of how very distracted Sherlock is that he hadn’t even noticed John coming to him.

Sherlock takes a tiny peck at the fragrant red sauce that coats the spoon held to his mouth. John looks at him expectantly and Sherlock slowly licks all traces of it from his lips and lets the complexity of the flavours develop before he swallows. Tomato, balsamic vinegar, onion – no, shallots – and tarragon.

“It’s delicious,” Sherlock murmurs and John beams at him.

“So we won’t be hearing excuses about the transport not needing dinner tonight, right?”

“Of course not,” Sherlock agrees just to see John’s pleased little nod, knowing that the likelihood of him still being on this time thread by the time dinner is ready is minimal.

Sherlock is overwhelmed by the futility of his current existence in an unexpected rush. It stops the breath in his throat and makes his heart ache. His whole life here is a farce, a half-life that he is playing along with and the longer he stays here in this limbo of John’s affection and the comfort of home, the harder he knows it will be to ever leave. Perhaps that’s why he lingers – he wants this more than he has been willing to admit to himself. Returning to reality is returning to… less, and remaining in this version of his life is the sweetest torment in which he has ever indulged. 

“John? What are we doing tomorrow?” 

“Nothing special. You said something about picking up a package from Bart’s? I’m not even going to ask,” John laughs.

“What about next week? Next month? Next year? In twenty years?”

John glances over his shoulder, smiles quizzically but doesn’t demur. “I don’t think we have any plans, love. Did you want to do something?”

“John, in a few years I’d very much like… when we retire, I thought....”

“Oh, we’re talking about Sussex?” John asks absently. His attention is divided between Sherlock’s attempts at conversation and the pan which is beginning to bubble quite alarmingly.

Sherlock’s heart is aching in a new and unpleasant way. He feels unsettled and pathetically grateful at once. “We’ve discussed this?”

“I thought we’d already decided. Big garden. No immediate neighbours to upset. A few apple trees and a veggie plot, a shower for me, a bath for you and a cat.”

“Dog, you mean,” Sherlock corrects automatically. John knows! It’s an actual fixed point on their shared horizon. The contentment and joy he felt while watching their garden is going to be their life at some undetermined point in their future… the future of this John and this Sherlock.

“I thought you said that a cat would be considerably less…”

“Dogs,” Sherlock insists. “Two of them.”

“Well, we have a few years to iron out the details,” John allows calmly.

“Hmm,” Sherlock offers in a manner that he hopes conveys that no points are in need of ironing – in, out or otherwise. “But in principle…”

“Sherlock, I love our life here – you and me. I love _you,_ you big git! And when we’ve had enough of risking our lives in wildly reckless ways here, I will love our life in Sussex. I’ll grow prize-winning courgettes and you’ll… I dunno… catalogue fertilizer composition or something. I’m looking forward to it. Wherever you are is where I want to be. As long as it’s you and me. And the cat.” John raises an eyebrow and gives Sherlock a cheeky wink.

Sherlock sniffs. “Dogs, John. And also bees.”

John turns and starts to protest at this, but Sherlock cuts him short by rounding the table and taking his face into his hands, relishing the scrape of stubble on his palm. He ducks down to kiss him, softly and sweetly and slowly, lingering over the way John responds so perfectly, so willingly. John cannot hold onto his indignation and he melts into the kiss, his culinary efforts forgotten. The spoon in his hand drops sauce onto the floor with a slow but irregular drip.

Reluctantly Sherlock steps back and watches John come back to himself. He is having ridiculous difficulty swallowing and there’s a suspicious pricking behind his eyes. John looks so… _happy_ , uncomplicatedly content with his lot – and it’s so very rare that Sherlock gets to see that on his own John. His eyes shine, his whole demeanour speaks to his joyfulness.

“I love you, John Watson.” Sherlock cannot resist saying it, just once, and the very moment he does, he knows he’s made a mistake. He knows his time here is up.

John looks mildly surprised, then beams at him, and only then notices the smoke and angry spitting noises coming from his pan. “Ah, shit…”

“I’m just popping out for some air,” Sherlock says, his voice rough. He takes advantage of John’s distraction, knowing how hard it would be to leave while John watched.

“But what about dinner?” John calls over his shoulder, madly stirring and adjusting the heat.

“Don’t worry. I’ll be home soon.” 

Sherlock takes his coat from its peg and with one last glimpse of his life here, he walks to the door, grits his teeth and pulls it open.


	6. Floating Toward Wakefulness

He had intended to fall or leap or make some sort of definitive gesture to prove to himself that this was a conscious choice rather than an inevitability, but there’s no time. 

There are no thoughts, just pain.

Everywhere.

So much pain it is hard to think or breathe or even cry out. Sherlock tries to ground himself for fear that he will be consumed by it and it’s the sound of John’s voice that he clings to. It anchors him to the present when it would be easier, so much easier, to follow the siren call of oblivion.

It’s not poetry any more; John is talking, narrating one half of a conversation and it’s a moment before Sherlock realises that John is talking to him – bargaining with him and pleading with him in urgent whispers. He pours secrets and admissions onto Sherlock’s unresponsive skin with a warm hand on Sherlock’s arm, his voice a well of aching, unrealised hopes. 

Sherlock yearns to see John but he cannot fight a way through the waves to tell his eyes to open. He has answers for him, words of his own to share but the sweet embrace of sleep tugs him away again before he can.

>>>><<<<<

Time continues to have little meaning at first. He registers just a series of momentary impressions: snippets of John’s voice reading from a case file or a newspaper, the vague awareness of changing light and fleeting brushes with pain that send him diving back to unconsciousness.

Each time he floats towards wakefulness his first thought is of John, his limited awareness searching out the sense that will most effectively signal his nearness: the scent of him, the touch of a warm, capable hand, the murmur of his voice – words indistinct but unmistakably his. And each time he is able to stay a little longer, rise a little higher, push further through the torpor of unconsciousness.

And this is how it is when he wakes next, with the double-edged gift of growing clarity and awareness.

There isn’t a centimetre of him that isn’t registering sensation, that isn’t screaming feedback about pressure or burning or friction. For a minute Sherlock thinks he might just slip away again into the haven of unconsciousness, but no such luck.

He breathes shallowly, holds each for as long as he can, then exhales. And again. And again. With each breath the onslaught recedes fractionally, dulling down to a background rumble of discomfort as other senses begin to come back to the fore. He focuses, forcing himself to catalogue the sensations, keeping the panic at bay.

His mouth is sour and dry like ashes, his tongue gummy and unpleasantly thick. He tries to swallow but there is no relief there. He wants to clear his throat but fears he might choke, so represses the urge. He feels as though his windpipe is constricting against something, but his muscles are too weak to give him the relief of a cough to expel whatever it is.

His nose is strangely sensitive; uncomfortable and stinging. It feels like he is trying to breathe deeply at the top of a mountain; lungs labouring in a thin atmosphere. Gradually he registers traces of scent, barely there; disinfectant, laundry detergent and something like plastic. Is he back in 221B after all? Has Mrs Hudson been on one of her cleaning binges again?

His hearing is taking longer to recover – sounds are still muffled and irritatingly elusive. It’s like noises are coming to him over the sound of the wind; even his own breath is a hissing, buzzing thing, and the saliva pooling in his mouth delivers the acute sense of drowning again. He manages to make a sound but it’s nothing but a watery groan.

Suddenly, there is movement – steps on linoleum, urgent voices which sound both alarmed but also positively surprised. Too exhausted to make sense of the conversation, Sherlock waits for it to be over. He’s not certain whether John is a part of it. He’s not certain of anything but the sensation which assaults him a moment later; an intense need to cough and a sudden freedom in his throat. He swallows and it feels like razor blades. Then he coughs until his cells are screaming for oxygen, until someone grabs his arm and the familiar calm of what must be an opiate floods his brain.

>>>><<<<<

There is nothing else for it – he must attempt the hardest part. His eyes are reluctant to open; heavy like lead and oversensitive to the light that is filtering through his closed eyelids. After a lengthy struggle Sherlock manages to crack open his right eye just the tiniest sliver.

The lighting level is low, but it is still much brighter than inside his eyelids. Slowly, slowly he angles his face to the side, blinking as his vision adjusts. His head pounds in protest at the sudden onslaught of sensory information.

Sherlock takes his time, forcing his eyes open little by little.

This is not 221B. Not even close. No, this is clearly some kind of medical facility and from the lack of noise, people and the low light, it is clearly some time during the night.

The brightest source of light close by is coming from a single lamp, angled down in deference to hour. It casts a pool of warm light over the figure of a slouched, sleeping man.

John Watson.

He looks like hell and he’s still about the most wonderful thing Sherlock has ever seen in his entire life. His hair is flat on one side and sticking up wildly on the other. He has several day’s worth of stubble on his chin and is wearing one of his most hideous cardigans. In addition to deep bruising around his eyes and the bridge of his nose, he has some nasty looking abrasions on one side of his temple and cheek. A sling supports his right arm, and he holds himself carefully, even in sleep, clearly protecting other less visible injuries. John looks tired in a way that a sleeping man surely should not. On his lap lies a paperback book with a familiar cover and on his shirt are the distinctive crumbs of a digestive biscuit, eaten in haste.

His chair is tucked as close to Sherlock’s bed as is practical. His head is supported by his shoulder at a most uncomfortable looking angle. His uninjured hand lies on Sherlock’s sheets, John’s small, practical fingers entangled with his own long pale ones. He follows the trail of his own arm up, noticing that he has a cannula on his wrist marked with red tape. He recognises that the snagging pain he felt earlier as he’d turned his head is caused by something taped in where his neck meets his collarbone and that a number of wires disappear inside the hospital gown he is wearing.

He considers all this for a moment, but it’s much more interesting to consider the man at his side.

John is holding his hand, as far as he practically can and Sherlock aches for a moment, remembering the John he left behind in his mind palace, the one whose touches came so naturally and were given so freely.

It takes him several seconds to persuade his hand to report that he can, in fact, feel the warmth of John’s fingers against his own. It’s several seconds more before he can untangle the necessary pathways to move those fingers. They twitch spasmodically, just a slight movement, but it gives Sherlock enough feedback and assurance to try again. Slowly he brings his fingers together, trapping John’s in a pathetically weak squeeze.

At first Sherlock thinks John is too deeply asleep for his gesture to have registered, but then there’s an answering squeeze.

Sherlock laboriously lifts his gaze back to John’s face and sees the moment his eyes flicker open, then widen in shock as he sits up, the book falling forgotten to the floor. Sherlock blinks at him slowly.

“Sherlock?” John whispers.

Very deliberately, Sherlock squeezes John’s hand again and watches as his astonished gaze tracks down to that point of contact and back to his face.

“Can you hear me?” John says, standing up and leaning down closer, watching closely for Sherlock’s reactions.

Sherlock is about to attempt to roll his eyes at the stupid question when he realises that although he can make out what John is saying, he is relying quite heavily on watching John’s mouth and on predicting the kind of (idiotic) things he might ask at times such as these.

He settles for a long blink and another squeeze on John’s hand to which John nods carefully.

Sherlock opens his mouth and attempts to lick his lips and John’s gaze sharpens, all traces of the exhausted man from earlier gone.

Turning his head, John says something that Sherlock cannot make out. He smiles reassuringly at Sherlock and a few moments later someone else arrives in the room with a cup. This seems to have set off a series of other events and Sherlock is dimly aware of people moving around and checks being made, but he keeps his eyes on John who gazes at him as if he has done something particularly impressive.

Momentarily confused as John untangles his fingers from his own, Sherlock is relieved when he takes the cup from somewhere and hooks an ice chip from it. He gently holds it against Sherlock’s lips, rubbing it back and forth slowly as Sherlock persuades his sluggish tongue to lick the moisture from his lips.

It’s heavenly and Sherlock tries to convey some of that through his eyes. Clever John seems to understand and he smiles at Sherlock’s greediness.

“Slowly,” John says with exaggerated care, then pops the remaining piece of ice between Sherlock’s cheek and gums. “Your throat’s probably still sore from the tube.”

John is wonderful. He is fantastic. Sherlock has rarely encountered such an insightful human being and wishes he could express that in some way, but he hasn’t yet tried to speak and he’s busily rolling the precious, sacred water around his mouth.

He tilts his head as others begin to flash lights in his eyes and take his stats but his gaze keeps straying back to John who has not ceded his place at Sherlock’s side and only grudgingly allows the other healthcare professionals to fulfil their tasks, stepping closer the second they have completed them.

It seems to take the longest time, and Sherlock battles to keep his eyes open throughout. Eventually they are left alone again. Sherlock is exhausted by the process but is reluctant to look away from John. He twitches his fingers, gaining John’s attention and clever, brilliant John carefully twines his fingers between Sherlock’s again.

Sherlock’s blinks are growing longer and longer, and John’s smile becomes soft.

“It’s okay. You can sleep. I’ll be here. Just don’t be gone too long this time,” John leans in and tells him, over-enunciating. 

Hearing damage of some sort then, Sherlock thinks. Temporary or permanent is impossible to discern without more data. He realises that his right arm is immobilized, bound across his chest just like John’s. The tape on the other wrist must be pertinent, but he can’t make the connection right now. 

Sherlock’s eyes slip closed, his focus squarely on how warm John’s fingers are and a kiss that doesn’t come.

>>>>><<<<<

The next few times Sherlock bothers with awareness, John is asleep. It’s as if they are taking it in turns to be awake. He notices the subtle changes that denote John’s actions – his chair having moved, an extra cup added to the quantity already stacked beside him, a different newspaper at the end of his bed. Sherlock doesn’t mind; it gives him an opportunity to watch John without being challenged on it. To watch another person sleep is very intimate – the trust needed to allow such vulnerability in front of another is significant and Sherlock is grateful for it.

Time is hard to quantify in this little room and the liminal space between sleeping and waking is hard to pinpoint. Sherlock is thankful that John keeps trying to keep him anchored to the present by pointing out the time and the date. Sherlock suspects he should feel some urgency to get on top of such things, but he is strangely content to allow this transition from broken to whole to play out in its own time.

Staff come and go and although they talk to him, presumably explaining what they are doing, little of it registers with Sherlock. His thoughts are shallow and fleeting in a way he feels should annoy him; must be the effect of sedatives and pain medication.

When he persuades his eyes to open again this time, there are two things that make it less pleasant than before. One is the absence of John. The other is the presence of Mycroft.

“Don’t worry. Doctor Watson will be here momentarily.” His brother smiles with something approaching genuine warmth, much to Sherlock’s surprise. “He has left to perform some basic hygiene functions that really couldn’t wait any longer.”

Sherlock’s eyes search the wall clock. Half six in the evening. Mycroft must have come from work. He looks towards the window on the opposite wall and sure enough, the sunshine is weak, coming from close to the horizon and without any real heat, but definitely present.

“I’ve been informed that your sedation has been tapered off. It should not impede your intelligence for much longer,” his brother promises.

With his perfect elocution, Mycroft’s lips are easy to read and Sherlock toys with the idea that he could pretend not to understand and save himself an irksome conversation.

Mycroft, ever the overachiever, promptly signs, ‘ _ I know you can understand me, brother mine, _ ’ at him in BSL.

Sherlock remembers them learning to sign together as children, hoping to have secret conversations literally behind their parent’s backs. Mummy had caught on quite quickly and reprimanded them. Then praised their ingenuity. 

If he closes his eyes again, he will be legitimately able to ignore his brother’s unexpectedly overt emotions for some time but since his thoughts do feel clearer, now, he’s impatient to survey the scene. 

Mycroft is waiting patiently when Sherlock’s gaze returns to him. Just for a moment he watches Mycroft’s relieved expression and, caught, his brother smiles wryly.

“It’s good to see you awake,” Mycroft says as he signs the same, both hesitantly, as if they weren’t entirely what he expected to say. “It appears the trauma team’s swift decision-making ensured a good prognosis, though I can tell your doctor was becoming increasingly concerned about your Sleeping Beauty act.”

Before it occurs to Sherlock to ask what he means, John is back, freshly showered, shaved and changed, and the odd conversation is mercifully over. John and Mycroft exchange some stilted niceties, but John can’t help his eyes straying to Sherlock again and again, and he wastes no time when Mycroft finally leaves, to slide back into his spot at Sherlock’s side. He’s limping and moving with exaggerated care but he pulls the chair closer still.

“Sorry, I didn’t want to leave you, but I was getting a bit ripe,” he explains ruefully. “Perks of being a doctor; they let me use the staff locker room showers. How are you doing?”

Instead of waiting for Sherlock’s response, he looks to the monitors beside the bed and slips his fingers across Sherlock’s wrist to find his pulse. His hands are warm and dry and comforting. Sherlock’s roving gaze has already noted the vitals monitor above his bed so John’s old-fashioned examination of his pulse must be for his comfort and reassurance, not for the acquisition of accurate data.

Someone has brought John some of his own clothes but the soap he’s used is something from the hospital rather than his own brand. Sherlock longs to bring John’s palm to his nose and breathe in the scent of him until he can find ‘John’ beneath the antiseptic and coffee and fear. His body is infuriatingly slow to return to him and his movements, when he can get the requisite part of him to respond are jerky and unpredictable. Most worrying is that getting his lips to form words is proving troublesome. It’s frustrating in the extreme, and he’s afraid to even try.

His arm flails when he tries to grasp John’s fingers and John captures his hand easily. Sherlock groans in irritation, his head rolling on his pillow as he fights for control. He has lost almost all coordination and he has no patience with such frailty in himself.

“It’s okay. This is normal. Sherlock! Sherlock, look at me. You need to calm down or you’ll send the pressure in your skull sky-high. It’s normal to be a bit out of it – you’ve been sedated for a few days, and your brain’s taken quite a knock. Things will improve, but you need to give it time. Understand?”

Sherlock stills and then squeezes John’s hand.

“Good, that’s good. Do you know who I am?”

There has never been a more ridiculous question in Sherlock’s view; he knew who John was even before he could recall his own name.

He squeezes John’s hand again and it makes the man smile. How is it that he finds reading John’s lips so easy, but finds it almost impossible to bring the words in his head to his lips? What  _ is _ this?

“Do you know where you are?”

Sherlock looks pointedly at the infusor pumps beside his bed and the heart monitor on the wall before he brings his gaze back to John in the most withering way he can. Apparently he is able to convey his point quite well, as John rolls his eyes at him.

“Ah, I see this has done nothing to impede what a smart-arse you are,” he chuckles.

The euphoria of this interaction floods Sherlock. His gratitude for this simple exchange and for John’s wit are overwhelming, but on their heels come a fresh wave of exhaustion. The frustration of his situation, at his loss of control and the slowness of his mind wells up and in horror, Sherlock finds himself weeping uncontrollably, something he hasn’t done in years. It’s ridiculous and mortifying, but he can’t stop. His chest heaves with the choking sobs – the only sound he’s managed to create so far that conveys any meaning. 

If John is surprised by this display of weakness, he conceals it well. In fact, he looks as though he might have expected it and something about that makes Sherlock feel even more unhinged.

John carefully leans closer and talks quietly to him. “Again, this is normal, Sherlock. Even you can’t avoid your emotions when your head has had the scrambling it’s just endured.”

Normal? How is any of this normal? Why is John speaking to him like a doctor and not like his friend? Why is he asking such inane questions?

John continues talking to him, his voice smooth like a river-worn stone and warm like coffee, and even though Sherlock loses the thread of his words since they are too muffled and distorted for him to hear clearly, he can’t help but be calmed by his tone. Competent fingers produce a handkerchief from somewhere and remove the oxygen line from his nostrils to wipe away the tears and snivels. John reseats the cannula and lets his fingers linger against Sherlock’s jaw briefly.

“Do you...” John starts but changes tack. “How much do you remember?”

Sherlock shakes his head. He’s too brittle to try to pick apart his alarmingly sparse recollections, but he does want to know. Being suspended in this confusion and disarray is intolerable.

“Do you want me to tell you what happened?” John asks quietly and waits for Sherlock’s nod. 

“The bomb detonated, the blast threw us into the back wall. All hell broke loose and the building began to come down. I pulled you into the pool, trying to avoid the falling debris.” John sounds matter-of-fact, as though the worst of the associated emotion has been worn away by repeatedly telling this story. “You took a worse battering than me,” he admits, voice now scratchy and eyes dancing away from Sherlock’s. With a brush of knuckles against his stubbled face, John moves his hand back to cover Sherlock’s fingers. “It was touch and go during transport; you were unconscious. Thought we were going to lose you.” 

John addresses his comments to the place where their hands touch. His face, bruised and scraped, is a picture of remembered misery and guilt. That cannot be borne without Sherlock making an effort to alter it.

“You… you…heard… you... ” Sherlock scrapes out. He wants to tell John that it was his voice that kept Sherlock tethered to reality, his voice that he clung to when nothing else made sense. But his throat is thick, as if speaking around an obstruction and it’s hard to make his mouth form the right sounds. It doesn’t seem to come out right at all, not enough words and slurred, but John looks up at him, a tired but incredulous smile on his face and it spurs him to try again.

“... John…”

John nods and holds his gaze for a moment of understanding before he continues.

“The CT showed an epidural bleed, and they didn’t waste any time taking you to theatre. There shouldn’t be – there’s no, I mean, it was just the bleed. They did an MRI the following day and they didn’t see any major contusions or bleeding inside your brain. It was just the epidural haematoma, a bleed  _ on _ your brain, yeah? But you had us all going there for a while because that raises the pressure inside your skull very quickly.”

There’s a contradiction in his words Sherlock can pick up on even in his current state. If loss of life was a possible outcome, why would John say it was ‘just’ something?

“Why…” Sherlock starts, “why…it…” He frowns, his breathing quickening when he realises he truly isn’t managing to push out the words he wants. “Just…just…what?”

John exhales through his nose and meets his eyes squarely – more doctor than friend again. “If a bleed like that is promptly removed before it does any major damage, prognosis is good. But there’s often at least a concussion even if they can’t see any contusions on the CT or the MRI they did twice when you were still intubated.”

At least? What does ‘at least’ mean?

“Jonn?” It’s no better this time; his voice remains raspy, barely there and poorly modulated. Sherlock looks to John to see if he’s being understood, but his expression is too difficult to decipher. He has to remember to speak slowly and deliberately to give his muscles time to react. It feels like panic is squeezing the air from him, as if he needs to make the choice between speech or breath. His heart thumps hard and he tries to force the words past an increasingly vice-like grip, but that just makes it worse.

“It’s okay,” John says, and Sherlock suspects he’s speaking louder and slower than normal to make sure Sherlock can lip-read everything. “Don’t tire yourself out. We’ll talk more about it later.”

Sherlock doesn’t want to talk about it later – he wants answers now. If they evacuated the haematoma (yes, Sherlock knows all the proper vocabulary, no need for John to dumb it down for him), why hasn’t he recovered faster? Why was there a need to keep him sedated for days? 

“What?” he tries again, increasingly alarmed. The sounds he is making bear only the slightest resemblance to the words in his head. The disconnect there seems to be deteriorating even further.

Now it appears that it is John who cannot contain his emotions successfully. He swallows hard and his lips tighten, his eyes suspiciously bright. For a few moments John’s face is unguarded and there is so much in that expression for Sherlock to unpack – concern, surprise, compassion – that he can barely begin to name them.

In an instant, Sherlock is utterly furious. John is keeping things from him, treating him like an infant and being deliberately obscure. How does he imagine, in his limited manner, that Sherlock might be incapable of understanding when he is withholding pertinent information about his injuries – information that he will need if he is to optimise his recovery. Would he have him lay there and rot instead, perhaps? Remain in wretched ignorance while the trustworthy doctor speaks for him and listens for him and makes all necessary decisions concerning his own health? It’s quite a subtle plan, really, John should be congratulated for taking Sherlock out of the equation so early in the game.

He growls and pulls his hand away from John’s sharply, setting up a wave of complaints from his shoulders and ribs at the sudden movement. Sherlock sees a flash of hurt in John’s eyes that is almost instantly replaced by an artificially bland expression that he almost pulls off. 

“It’s okay,” John says without inflection or emotion. “Just keep calm and we’ll think it through, okay? I’m upset, I’m tired and I’m not great at seeing you in pain, stuck in a bed in critical care. I’m not hiding things from you, I don’t know more than you, but, even though things are improving and you’re recovering well, I would much rather be at home, getting ticked off at you for dripping pig carcass fluids in the salad crisper, okay?”

With a gust of held breath, the tension leaves Sherlock’s body all at once. Of course. _ Of course!  _ This is the man who shot the cabbie for him. The man who offers him breakfast every day, even though Sherlock only eats it once a fortnight. This is  _ John, _ who has been at his bedside for as yet uncounted days, reading to him and advocating for him when he’s been unable to do so himself. His John.

With a low, broken sound, he fumbles for the man’s hand again and is close to tears again when John’s forgiving fingers find his, and hold on tightly.

“It’s okay,” he repeats, this time sounding much more like himself, solace and compassion at the fore. “Don’t beat yourself up – it’s another symptom of brain injury cases and it improves, okay? Your moods are going to be labile at first. Try not to worry about it. Happens even in milder injuries, and yours is still being assessed.”

Sherlock’s brain is already off on a deductive tangent; either John thinks his injury is higher on that scale or nobody knows quite yet. Either way, it’s one more hateful thing he’s going to have to wait for, and he _ hates _ waiting.

John’s eyes are tired, and despite the shower and the fresh clothes, he looks like he could sleep for a week, but not even an idiot could miss that below the fatigue and the worry, it’s relief and joy that are keeping him on his feet, and the anticipation of seeing Sherlock home again that is encouraging him to put one weary step after another.

“Sherlock, I…” John struggles to find a place to broach the next sentence, but a perfunctory knock at the door interrupts them before he can, and a short, plump woman with kind eyes and an assured manner enters the room. She’s followed by a nurse who announces that he’s here to check Sherlock’s vitals. 

John instantly moves his hand away from Sherlock’s and slides back deeper into his seat with a guilty glance at the newcomers.

His hand twitching after John’s, Sherlock misses his touch and loathes the distance that embarrassment has put between them. He wants to demand that he return, but he cannot even begin to think of the shape of the sounds he would need to speak that.

“Good Morning. I am Dr Rahii Kumari. I am glad you have decided to join us this morning.” She looks expectant, but Sherlock doesn’t appreciate strange doctors attempting to be humorous and just glares at her.

John clears his throat. “He was asking what had happened. I don’t think he remembers much beyond the explosion.” 

Doctor Kumari gives a tight smile. “That’s entirely normal, Mister Holmes. You were sedated for a few days; I’m afraid we had to keep you under until the pressure in your skull was stable and sedation breaks no longer threatened to raise it or produce seizures. We had a couple of false starts trying to extubate when you became too restless and we feared it would be too much for your brain. Dr Watson here tells me that it is your most prized possession.” 

She smirks briefly at her little witticism before surveying the readings on the vitals monitor while the nurse makes notes on the computer in the corner of the room.

“You’re in the critical care ward, and I am the neurology consultant for the unit this week. Before we do a more detailed neurological exam, I would like to hear from you myself what the last thing is that you remember?” she asks once the nurse leaves. “We need to establish the extent of any amnesia.”

Sherlock is unwilling to respond, his attention squarely on John who is refusing to return his gaze. He has the strangest sensation of loneliness, of missing John even as he’s standing right there, not three metres away.

“Has he spoken yet?” she asks, directing her words at John.

Before responding, John clears his throat and glances momentarily at Sherlock. “Yes, well, the explosion blew his eardrums, but he’s been reacting to my words and trying to say something. Not much yet, but something.” 

Dr Kumari raises an eyebrow and Sherlock’s not sure if she looks concerned or impressed. 

She turns back to Sherlock. “Do you know where you are?”

Sherlock nods carefully.

Dr Kumari’s eyes are uncompromising and intelligent. “And your name?”

His lips and jaw remember how to make the first sound in his name, but all that emerges is a truncated, choking breath which ends in a coughing fit. 

It’s his  _ name _ . Of course he remembers it, but his mouth does not.

“That’s fine. Take your time,” Dr Kumari invites. She allows Sherlock to struggle for a few seconds longer, watching carefully before digging out a pen lamp from her pocket. She inspects his pupil reactions while asking about symptoms. “Any nausea?”

Sherlock shakes his head.

“Did he manage words, or just syllables?” she asks John. “Fluent or non-fluent?”

“Words, only a bit mangled. Something in between,” John admits. “More fluent than not,” he reports. “Maybe.”

“Headache?” Kumari then asks Sherlock.

His shrug is more of a twitch, because it sends a lancing pain through his right shoulder.

John notices. “His shoulder was dislocated. They set it at the end of surgery.”

“Let us try something else,” Dr Kumari says, watching carefully. “Do you know the name of the current Prime Minister?”

Sherlock shakes his head abruptly and his shoulder throbs sickeningly. His eyes swing back to John like a compass finding north. And there he is, trying to shrink back into the wall; his guide, his source of inspiration and his path home, ready to catch his panicked gaze and returning one full of confusion. 

John recovers quickly; masking his concern, he musters an encouraging smile from somewhere. “To be fair, he wouldn’t know the answer to that one. He’s very selective about what he remembers and what he deletes.”

“Deletes?” the doctor asks, her eyebrows rising again. She might even give John a run for his money with the exaggeration of facial expression. 

“Yes, he deletes information that he deems irrelevant to make more space for important data.” John’s voice is strangely proud.

“Well, that’s quite a trick,” she says, turning back to look at Sherlock. “You must teach me that one day, Mr Holmes. Now I’m sure Dr Watson may well have already told you that recovery after a traumatic brain injury involving an intracranial hemorrhage can be sporadic and uneven so I will just ask you one more question before I leave you to rest, okay?”

Sherlock turns his face to her again and nods jerkily. He feels a roar of anguish building in his abdomen, swelling his ribs and tensing his shoulders to the point of discomfort. He cannot have worked so hard to return to John just to be afflicted with the inability to tell him why.

“Can you tell me about the last thing you remember?”

He thinks of John tapping away at his laptop, John stirring sauce, John dancing in their kitchen. Sherlock thinks of kisses on the sofa, toast for breakfast and his garden. Their garden. Their future garden.

He breathes slowly, instructing himself to be calm, giving the words time to bubble up by themselves.

Kumari is watching him closely but not giving away anything that might alert Sherlock to her thoughts.

He falters, suddenly uncertain. The garden isn’t where he was when he was injured. It wasn’t Baker Street and an evening in. That wasn’t John. It wasn’t real. It was… it was...

But it pulls him back in a landslide of scents and colours and sensations and emotions.

It had felt so real. 

He can still smell the night-scented stocks. He remembers the light glowing out through the curtains of their bedroom, warm and inviting, and he hears the wind worrying the leaves on the birches. John is there, he knows, his reading glasses slipping down his nose as he nods over yet another terrible paperback. In a moment, Sherlock will lift the book from his hands and John will grin at him sleepily, woken by the movement. He will place his glasses on the bedside table and switch off the lamp. He will roll to face Sherlock and they will study each other’s faces in the moonlight as they murmur their goodnights and exchange kisses…

Sherlock’s eyes slide, always,  _ always  _ to John, standing a respectful distance from the bed – his soldier, his doctor, his friend, and he sees from the way that John licks his lips that he has been silent for too long. Sherlock closes his eyes, chasing the memory of a day that hasn’t yet happened and likely never will.

It takes a while, but Dr Kumari gives up eventually and goes away.


	7. No Place Like Home

It’s been five long days since Sherlock woke to find himself in the Critical Care Unit of the Royal London with a slightly battered but reassuringly alive John Watson at his side. Bruised but not broken, John’s arm is already out of his sling although Sherlock can tell it has exacerbated the pain from his old Afghanistan injury. Other than his head injury, Sherlock has a broken rib and a broken clavicle, a torn labrum in his shoulder socket which may or may not require surgery at a later date. 

He continues to have no words. Not ones he’d accept, anyway.

John keeps telling him it’s logical and normal, that the bleed had been pressing on the area where his brain sculpts thoughts into sounds and words, and that turning words into sentences is a complicated process requiring a bit too much from a brain recovering from being bounced against his skull. John keeps telling him that it’ll take time to regain his speech but that he _will_ regain it.

If only Broca’s aphasia – a fancy name for being able to pronounce things quite normally but not being able to connect thoughts into words – was his only remaining problem. His difficulties are compounded by feeling stunned, tongue-tied, unsafe even when he’s just trying to organise thoughts inside his head without daring to verbalise them. He’s beset by the fear that at any given moment his words will scatter like birds frightened to flight. Sometimes, they’re not there at all. And while he’s not a doctor, he knows that’s not a typical consequence of getting one’s head knocked about a bit. That’s not how traumatic aphasia works; there has to be more to it.

The longer he waits, the longer he keeps chasing those words, the more the distance between them and his thoughts grows. It is a strangely familiar sensation but Sherlock cannot pin down why that should be. Even John cannot always hide his frustration when Sherlock refuses to even attempt to speak.

His parents have visited several times and seem to have made firm friends with John. Perhaps they hope John is a secret boyfriend who Sherlock has failed to mention and each visit they find him here beside Sherlock’s bed their expressions glow with pleasure thinking their second son has finally found love. The irony is suffocating. 

Mycroft has continued to ignore Sherlock’s obvious dislike of his presence and has continued to visit him at least every other day. He bores Sherlock and then presumably also bores John as he insists on conversing with him even when Sherlock sends him away. John doesn’t have a great deal of time for boring, overbearing brothers but always spares Mycroft more than enough time to update him on Sherlock’s progress when he visits, walking him out of the ward and returning with tea in an effort to cheer Sherlock up afterwards.

Sherlock still has no memory of the hours leading up to the detonation of the bomb and only a partial recollection of the days prior. Mycroft tells him that James Moriarty died in the explosion, but without genuine memories of his own, there is no sense of resolution in that fact. Sherlock tries not to dwell on the gaps in his recollections and has avoided accessing his mind palace in any but the most superficial of manners, disturbed by what he might find. 

The list of things he is being treated for continues to shrink as possibilities are ruled out and tests begin to spell out the incredible escape that he and John have had. His clavicle fracture is mending. His broken rib aches which means coughing is hellish, but his burns were superficial. The lacerations are fading and every day, he and John look more like the men they were before. Sherlock’s hearing is improving, encouraging those specialists into a cautious prognosis of little to no lasting damage done. 

He has been moved to the neurosurgical ward; he suspects Mycroft may have had a hand in procuring a private room there. His head injury seems to be the biggest cause for concern and nobody seems to want to give definitive answers to the questions he prompts John to ask for him – he has become quite a master of interpreting Sherlock’s significant looks. Perhaps he would have asked them anyway; he seems to have appointed himself some kind of a proxy while Sherlock shrouds himself in silence. He knows that his cognitive abilities have not been adversely affected in a significant way – although the sedation effects lingered for a time, his thinking has regained its clarity – but John is the only person that he was willing to attempt talking for, and after that failure, he can't really see the point.

Everyone is being very positive about it being ‘early days’ in his recovery and adopting a watchful waiting approach, but Sherlock knows what their pauses mean when he fails to speak and how they are careful to leave the room before they discuss his symptoms and progress. They all say the same thing; there might be minor residual effects from the pressure of the bleed, but they should resolve. No one wants to speculate on how long that might take though. 

John is his one constant, unflappable and solid. He doesn’t seek to persuade Sherlock of his undoubted recovery but he sits and endures the visits of a seemingly endless stream of specialists, asking questions and providing answers when the patient can’t. Sherlock has, at least, been able to bully his fine motor skills into allowing him to write responses and questions. John intercepts his scribbles and reports on his text messages whenever there’s a new consultant and translates them for public consumption all the while glaring at Sherlock or trying to repress inappropriate grins at the (evidently) outrageous things he has written.

When he hasn’t been actively regaining his strength and recovering from his injuries, he’s been watching John, to the extent that he thinks John may have noticed. He’s starting to worry that it appears to be something he does without conscious thought. He’d assumed that with his improving emotional control, he would soon be in a position to put his attraction to John back in the depths of his mind. Once he’d become part of the world again, he’d expected his responses to John’s presence to dull, to return to their status quo of flatmates, colleagues and friends. That isn’t how it has been, though. It’s ridiculous and futile, but he misses the other John, even though he doesn’t exist other than in his own addled brain. For every similarity he sees, his heart leaps only for his hopes to be dashed whenever John disengages from him, when he breaks their gaze, when he keeps his distance. If Sherlock could find a way to cross the line that has arisen between them and make this John smile at him in the same way as the other, he would do it in an instant. 

He has wracked his brain trying to pinpoint what it is that makes their relationship here differ from the one in his mind palace – what had been the moment their paths diverged and the different outcomes dictated? The question plagues him: what happened that would have made them so wary, to have them hide behind their friendship even though Sherlock is convinced that they could have so much more? 

It’s maddening – Sherlock has _seen_ that John has considered what they could be. For every nervous gesture of denial that John makes, his body makes a dozen more that tell of attraction; little things that John doesn't even realise he does. 

While John is devoted to Sherlock in a way that has him at his bedside all hours of the day and night, his love and affection are walled off behind a barrier that Sherlock cannot begin to understand the reason for. He is surprised at how hard that is to accept, but that’s what he must do if this is all he will truly ever have of John.

Even as Sherlock listens to his idiot speech therapists persuade him of the benefits of their expertise on his verbal skills, he knows that there is nothing they can say that will give him back the other John. He endures the examinations and, at first, even attempted some of the exercises they gave him to complete, but the second he opened his mouth and heard the horror of utter rubbish that he poured forth, it only reinforced his decision to avoid speaking altogether. An untrained observer may only have been able to tell something was wrong by the fact that his sentences might be short or clipped, the words laboriously chosen but scrambled on the delivery. Sherlock won’t settle for less than complete functioning, and refuses to humiliate himself in front of strangers. Besides, progress in therapy would mean having to try harder with everyone else. True, it pains him to disappoint John with his apparent lack of engagement but he cannot risk embarrassment or the potential for damage inherent in opening his mouth.

With Dr Watson fully focused on him and his recovery, it’s easy to imagine this fragile state in which his hospitalisation is allowing John to cross certain boundaries, might continue. But what if he lets slip something John isn’t ready for, or actively doesn’t want? Sherlock’s always been quick-witted, had an extensive vocabulary, but his language is that of fact and science, not at all suited to expressing sentiment. He has no idea how to put his regard for John into gentle words; he wouldn’t have known even had he been in optimum health. To attempt it now would be foolhardy in the extreme.

He’s afraid of trying to converse with John for fear that he might do something wrong, say the wrong thing and drive him even further away. Sherlock has revealed his deepest self, bared his soul to himself in his head now, and he fears more than anything the possibility that he might repeat these revelations and fracture their relationship by not being in control of his own speech. His inappropriate words might have betrayed him before, but now he’s also at the mercy of the aftereffects of the injury.

He’d rather stay silent than say something unwise accidentally; he’s never been good at this sort of thing and the potential for disaster here is magnified by his injury and his lack of adequate emotional control. Just the speech difficulties would be mortifying enough, but there is a further danger posed by the fact his emotions currently run unchecked just as he’d been told they might. His brain bouncing off his skull then being compressed by the resulting bleed has had effects that are only becoming more apparent each day. John takes Sherlock’s fears, furies and tears in his stride but Sherlock loathes it and cannot bear that he can’t catch his emotions before they’re already pouring out of him. He feels exposed and transparent despite the quiet protective empathy that John seeks to offer him.

So he says nothing – not even the speech therapist can persuade him to try any more. Why tempt fate now? Who knows what further damage he might do unintentionally? He has nothing but time on his hands; he will wait until these feelings recede or until he is assured that he has more control over the words he speaks even though the specialists tell him that without practice there will be limited improvement. 

In this silence Sherlock watches John’s hands and remembers how warm they are, how confident, and how they move unerringly to the most precise spot to make Sherlock shiver or gasp. He watches John’s lips until they drive him to distraction – having tasted them, having learned their shape and heat and the ways that John will nudge Sherlock’s own mouth open to kiss him more deeply makes him ache in a way that no amount of medication or sleep can touch. 

So, while toiling to regain mastery of his own physiology, brain and otherwise, Sherlock is silently mourning the loss of an imaginary lover, whose doppelganger haunts his room, day in, day out. 

>>>>><<<<<

Sherlock is pleased to be discharged after a little under a week later. He’s continually pestered by people coming to measure things, dress things, discuss things and is heartily sick of being on show the whole time. Home sounds indescribably good to him and he counts the minutes from the moment the subject is raised to the moment Mycroft’s car drops them outside the flat. In all that has happened subsequently, he had almost forgotten the explosion that blew in the windows of 221B at the beginning of those fractured days, but John tells him that his brother has seen to the repair of the flat and everything seems to be much as it ever was only tidier and a lot less dusty after his Mycroft’s attentions. 

Now they have returned to Baker Street, John seems to be rebuilding the walls even stronger and higher than they were before. After the support and open devotion he showed while Sherlock was in hospital, he has scaled back his attentions and even been deliberately avoiding him for some period each day since their return. Sherlock isn’t sure whether that’s because he is sick of the sight of him, is giving him some breathing space after a week of almost constant monitoring or for some other reason that Sherlock has been unable to discern. Perhaps he is just profoundly rattled by being targeted by such a madman as Moriarty? Sherlock had picked up on the man’s irritation over his fascination with the master criminal but been unable to ascertain the reason. Perhaps the two points are linked?

What makes things even more painful is that John’s withdrawal is not consistent, which suggests that it is deliberate. Once or twice a day John will forget himself for a few minutes and something of their former closeness emerges; Sherlock can pinpoint the second John remembers each time – his shoulders go back, his chin rises and he takes a steadying breath before carefully, consciously disengaging again. 

It hurts more than Sherlock can say. Literally.

Not only does he ache for the man in his mind palace, but he finds he misses his real John too, in a way that makes very little sense. He misses the easiness of their friendship, which whilst not what he’d dreamed of, has clearly become necessary to his continued wellbeing. Sherlock longs for his smiles and his high-pitched giggles, he misses shared tea and comfortable silences even if only in the privacy of 221B. He misses the fact that he could be himself and had almost come to trust that John wouldn’t be repelled by his personality quirks, but would forgive him for his lapses in societal norms. He feels as if he is watching John withdraw, leaving a shadow in his place. He may look like him and sound like him, but Sherlock knows there is more, so close to the surface that he can almost touch it, yet he cannot put it into words. He appears to be missing a John Watson that doesn’t exist anywhere.

Of course, John also sustained injuries; burns, a dislocated knee, his shoulder injury, fractured ribs and uncounted abrasions and bruises. These are things that would slow any man who wasn't John Watson, but he doesn’t complain. After Mrs Hudson’s disastrous visit to the hospital where she had spent more time in tears than in bringing good wishes, Sherlock appreciates even more that John is one of the few people who talk to him and, outwardly at least, treat him as they always have. 

John is trying to coax back Sherlock’s words and keeps chastising him for refusing speech therapy now altogether. Sherlock thinks it quite logical but can’t explain this to John; how could some therapist help him with something no one can fix? The words _are_ in his head, but they are not kept tethered by a banged-up motor cortex. No, what impedes them is his limbic system, suspended in horror of losing John altogether. 

John chats to him, leaving obvious gaps for Sherlock to leap in and make an observation, should he suddenly find the inspiration to do so. John rolls his eyes at him, calls him an idiot, bullies him to eat and drink, doesn’t let him get away with any of the tricks that pity allows him to exploit in other visitors – as convalescent nursing goes, John’s is top notch in taking no prisoners and tailoring his approach to his current patient. 

Other than a partially lost week and the fact that he cannot speak, he is making impressive progress in regaining his mental faculties, astounding everyone but John and his brother. His physical injuries are taking longer to heal and no amount of willpower seems to have an effect on his body’s ability to repair itself any quicker than an average human. It’s utterly tedious. When he had finally managed to convey to John via text how long the gaps in his memory were, he was told his brain injury ranked somewhere in the grey area between mild and moderate. He should recover, the medical professionals told him. Should. It sounded like an imperative. It sounded as though they thought he _would_ recover if he only did what he was told. 

Sherlock hopes that now he is at home in John’s care, his rate of physical recovery will increase. John is an excellent doctor – a trauma surgeon, no less, and it was rather galling to have to endure the amateurish efforts of his so-called experts at the hospital when he had a perfectly good physician sitting silent at his bedside seeming to count the hours until they were free of the medical facility as eagerly as Sherlock was himself.

Those brought on by the physical realities of his injuries are not the only changes produced by the explosion. The time he spent in his mind palace seems to have wrought some changes in Sherlock’s attitude. He’s told it’s quite normal for a person’s characteristics and indeed entire personalities to be altered by the injuries and the subsequent unresponsive, sedated state he experienced. He finds it hard to judge how significant such alterations might be, but he sometimes catches John’s surprised glances and understands this means there must be some noticeable deviation. Is it brought on by the injury or the revelations he’d had while sedated – and does it even matter which?

As if on cue, John arrives with tea, one last cup before bedtime. He still looks a little uncomfortable in Sherlock’s bedroom having been in here more in the last few days than he has in the last six moths. When Sherlock pointedly shifts across the mattress as best he can to make room for him, he hesitates. Sherlock pretends not to notice but cannot help but watch the uncertainty on John’s face as he ponders. When did such an innocuous gesture become something to be weighed up and judged? With a slow breath, John sits, twisting so he can rest against the headboard, and Sherlock hates the pathetic relief that floods his veins.

Sherlock touches his own ribs and gestures towards him, watching now as John cautiously relaxes back, his face softening when the expected pain doesn’t come.

“I’m fine. I just don’t bounce back as fast as I used to.” John rolls his eyes at his body’s failings. “And you got the worst of the blast by far.”

They have established that Sherlock’s ideal medium for conversation is his phone, despite John’s exhortations to try to use his voice, and he reaches for it now and types, then shows it to John.

**I’m told it could have been a lot worse. You saved my life. Again. It’s a bad habit of yours.**

“More luck than judgement this time I’m afraid,” John shrugs. “If you could stop coming to the attention of criminal masterminds, that would help enormously.”

They smirk at each other and Sherlock feels his spirits rise. John _is_ in there still. He’s not completely disappeared into the role of protective doctor and primary carer. 

**I will do my best,** Sherlock types with mock-solemnity and the moment passes allowing this strained quiet to settle upon them again. It feels brittle and artificial but neither of them seem to know how to move past it. 

“So you still don’t remember any of what happened at the pool?” John asks suddenly. He fists his hands in his lap and doesn’t look up to see Sherlock’s reaction.

Sherlock shakes his head slowly. 

**I’ve read the police report but it feels like something that happened to someone else.** He’s been told it’s unlikely that he’ll regain those memories. John will have to keep them for him.

John fiddles with a crease in the bed linens, his face tilted away from Sherlock. “He was insane, obsessed with you. He talked about you like he knew you, like he had been watching you for a long, long time. He knew things he shouldn’t have. He said I was your weakness, the key to your downfall…”

John trails off and Sherlock is seized with a wave of longing so hard it’s a physical ache. His John… the _other_ John, would never have begun a conversation like this without Sherlock in his arms, his hands sliding through his hair, soothing the sting. His words would have been punctuated with squeezes and caresses, with kisses and pats, all kinds of physical reassurances that Sherlock would have scoffed at before he knew the intense contentment and strength that could come from such support.

“He said I wasn’t worthy of you, that he was going to fix it and then you’d see he’d been right.”

Jim Moriarty had been more gifted than Sherlock had realised, and he had seen and named things about him that Sherlock hadn’t even understood about himself. He’d known where to aim when the time had come to act. Sherlock is quite glad in many ways that he won’t have the memory of John Watson in a waistcoat made of Semtex. The nightmares he has started to have are more than enough without the added element of actual recall.

His throat full of words that won’t work and won’t comfort, Sherlock’s fingers fumble on the keys of his phone.

**He was insane, John – you said so yourself.**

John seems unconvinced by Sherlock’s weak assurances, but shifts the conversational topic elsewhere. He’s begun to test Sherlock, ensuring that no other memories of their time together have been corrupted by his head injury. Sherlock doesn’t tell him about his mind palace and the ruin he fears will greet him on his next visit. Sherlock doesn’t tell him anything, full stop.

Of course John, being John, thinks that he is going about this interrogation in a terribly subtle manner, and so Sherlock lets him believe. 

“You’ve had a card from some of the guys from New Scotland Yard. It has hedgehogs on it.”

**I expect Anderson picked it out. Whimsical, facile and tasteless – that sounds like something he would choose,** Sherlock types.

Writing gives him a level of security he craves; he can read back to himself in his head what he’s saying, and can be more certain that nothing unintended is contained in the message. Connecting words to speech… making sure nothing that comes out of his mouth is a danger to this fragile peace is… too hard.

John quirks a lip in amusement – Sherlock has clearly passed today’s test by remembering the name of one of the members of Lestrade’s team.

“And Angelo sends his regards. Says he’s looking forward to seeing you as soon as you’re up to it,” John reports, watching Sherlock carefully but not overtly.

Sherlock doesn’t need to dig for that memory at all, or any memory so closely linked with John. It was the first time they’d shared a meal although, being on a case, he hadn’t actually ordered anything. John had surprised him with his willingness to be placed in unknown danger and with his direct approach to finding out the things he wanted to know. It had been… refreshing. He’d asked if Sherlock had a girlfriend and when he’d replied in the negative, had gone on to ask about a boyfriend. And Sherlock, being the idiot that he is, had made it uncomfortable and embarrassing with a terse response and an awkward rebuff of John’s naive (and instantly denied) advances.

Sherlock pauses and reconsiders the exchange. Once again he finds himself obsessing over what the turning point for the John and Sherlock in his mind had been. The other John he had created there had been so similar to the real John Watson, so nearly his John that Sherlock had determined that the difference that had made him demonstrative and easy there must have had its basis in something that had really happened. It hadn’t occurred to him that this difference could have been something that _he_ had done rather than something from John’s past. But now the memory of that night and the importance John seems to still hang upon it makes Sherlock suddenly nauseous. If Sherlock had responded differently, if he had been more ambiguous, less dismissive then perhaps… Perhaps that one conversation had been the turning point that had sent his and John’s story off in this direction rather than the direction the projected John from his mind had followed. Maybe he himself had scuppered any chance of John’s affection or love without even realising what he was ruining as he merely reacted instead of considering the consequences of his words. John had been interesting, different, and his sudden and direct questions had made Sherlock feel exposed and under a scrutiny he was more used to employing than attracting.

These thoughts, once considered, now throw up a number of other situations where Sherlock’s actions could have been modified to allow for the possibility of a relationship developing. How very fitting, Sherlock cannot help but think. He has created this life, this friendship and camaraderie and partnership that he cherishes above all others, but in doing so has also consigned himself to something that could have been more had he not been so skittish, arrogant or distracted. A prison of his own making. If he’d only paid attention right from the start, and seen John for the gift that he truly was… If he’d only looked at the potential of John, the bravery, the loyalty, the kindness and seen in him the perfect foil to his own shortcomings. How might he have replied in a way that would have left room for interpretation, for hope? If he’d only realised why he’d been so instantly fascinated, so _drawn_ to the man. He’d recognised his own atypical reaction to John but hadn’t understood its significance. Idiot.

How can he now repair damage done at so early and fragile a stage in their relationship? 

**We could go today. He makes an excellent Tiramisu,** Sherlock types.

“We’ll see,” John says cagily. “You are still supposed to be resting. Maybe when you’re off your antiepileptic meds.”

Sherlock simply repeats, **Tiramisu** , and John gives him an exasperated glare. 

“How about this? If you eat three meals a day, get seven hours of sleep a night for the rest of the week, then we’ll go.”

**Two meals, one of which is toast and five hours of sleep,** Sherlock counters.

John ponders and clearly decides to quit while he is ahead. “Done, but the toast has an egg on it. And there will be napping.”

Sherlock yawns hugely as if on cue and then scowls at John’s smug smile.

**Fine** , he types, but before he sends the message, his finger is left hovering over the screen.

Why can’t he just say it? It’s a word he can manage, just a remark devoid of overt emotional significance.

He opens his mouth, draws a breath but anxiety floods in and drowns his synapses like a fuse shorting. John watches him and Sherlock is certain he must look like an idiot, gaping like the goldfish Mycroft had declared he was even as a child. He exhales audibly, snaps his mouth shut and sends the damned, wretched text.

John knows to expect it and takes the phone once more to read it. 

“Fine.”

As their strained smiles fade, John’s face gets that unfathomable look that indicates that he’s noticed that their interaction has gone beyond the invisible point John deems ‘far enough’. Or, perhaps he recognises that even a single word is still beyond his flatmate’s grasp, although he usually does better to hide the disappointment. 

With a subdued, “Good night, then,” John slides off the bed and shuffles to the door. He glances back, looks poised to say something more, but taps the door twice instead and passes through it.

Sherlock rolls his eyes at that, but the truth is that he has never slept so much in his life. John insists that it is normal and also beneficial for him to sleep more than he usually would, explaining how his brain is adapting and repairing itself and how sleep is necessary for that to occur, as if Sherlock is some kind of idiot. Sherlock knows he’s right, but it doesn’t feel particularly beneficial. 


	8. When the Dam Breaks

That night he dreams of the pool, but he’s almost certain that it’s an image that he’s created out of fragments of truth. Strangely, it’s the smells that disturb him most – burning, chlorine and dry concrete dust, and when he wakes, trembling and disoriented, he breathes through his nose for long minutes, reassuring himself that there is nothing there that shouldn’t be. 

Sometimes it is Moriarty who steps from the darkness in these dreams, but at other times it is John. Sometimes he has a gun, at others he holds the phone which will detonate the bomb strapped to Sherlock’s torso with the tap of a button. 

Objectively, Sherlock knows that this is his healing mind making sense of the pieces of information he has been given, trying to fill the gap in his memory in a way that makes sense and satisfies him. He’s not sure if it’s a product of his emotional reboot, but at a primal level, the dreams unnerve and upset him for hours after awakening. 

The reports tell him that John was fitted with a vest wired with explosives, they tell him of the powerplay which preceded the detonation, the back and forth of the advantage and the dizzying pace of the shifts as he and Moriarty sparred to keep the upper hand. They also tell him that to give them both a chance to make it out alive, he’d taken the terrible gamble of shooting the bomb.

It’s a sobering truth that makes him bury his face in his pillow instead of alerting John to his level of distress as he emerges violently from these dreams: if he doesn’t get John killed through the simple matter of their acquaintance, he may inadvertently evict the man from his life with his feelings. 

Sometimes he thinks he’s finding glimpses of real memories of that night; the crazed glint of mania in ‘Jim from IT’s eyes, the horrified understanding dawning in John’s, the dancing red dots of laser sights searching them out. There’s his own hand, the cool heft of a pistol in his grasp, trembling slightly with the magnitude of his choice.

The only constant in the dreams is his lack of a voice. No matter how he struggles, the words won’t come. He knows this is something he has added to the narrative himself – the police reports carry pages of transcripts, all the things he had said. 

When Sherlock jerks awake later that night, there is a tense atmosphere and the echo of his terrified shout on the still, nighttime air. This one had been too intense, too real for him to stifle his cries.

“Sherlock?” John calls so loudly that even he can hear the panic in it. 

The bed upstairs creaks violently – John reaching quickly for his phone or his gun, or both. 

Sherlock fumbles for his own phone, his hand sweaty and trembling.

**I’m fine. Nightmare.**

After a moment to read the message, Sherlock hears John rise. His movements are brisk and purposeful, walking to his door, reconsidering and returning to his dresser. Sherlock hears the drawers slide, then John is padding down the stairs and sticking his head around the door. He’s pulled on a T-shirt and his old, ratty bathrobe.

“You okay?”

Sherlock nods unevenly but John lingers.

“Can I come in?”

Sherlock tips his head forward, struggling to slow his breathing and put aside the terror that lingers from his dream. Realistically, John cannot be able to see very much from the dim glow of the streetlights through the window, but he hesitates for only a second more before he slips inside and pushes the door closed again. 

He sits on the bed carefully. Surely the slight dip and roll of the mattress settling shouldn’t make Sherlock’s stomach swoop like this. 

“You shouted out. First time that’s happened,” John offers so quietly that without the late hour and John’s proximity, Sherlock would have struggled to hear it. “That used to be my party piece,” he adds tentatively, perhaps to both gauge Sherlock’s mood and to lessen his embarrassment. If John rarely came into his room during the day before now, Sherlock can count the number of times John has entered at night on the fingers of no hands. 

Sherlock doesn’t move or acknowledge John’s words in any way but still he stays. With a deep and sudden sigh John shuffles back on the covers and lies down beside Sherlock.

It feels like every function of Sherlock’s body ceases other than the erratic thud of his heart, which John must surely be able to hear.

John settles on his back, his head sinking into the pillow as he intertwines his fingers and rests his joined hands on his stomach. 

“I had terrible dreams when I first came home from the army,” he says. “I was lucky to get three hours of sleep a night. I’d wake up in a state and be too afraid to go back to sleep again.” His words are difficult and private, but he speaks them in a low, matter-of-fact tone that Sherlock realises he must have used to soothe a lot of patients in his career. 

“I knew they were just dreams, I knew they weren’t real and a lot of the time they were worse than the things I’d experienced, but the knowing didn’t help. At two in the morning, it feels like any of those things might have happened. Or could happen.” John shifts a little, his cotton t-shirt rustling as he makes himself more comfortable on Sherlock’s sheets. “Could have used some company on those nights. A distraction or whatever.”

He is quiet for several minutes and Sherlock lies still and tries not to fidget or breathe too loudly – anything that might cause John to remember where he is and decide to return to his own bed. It’s comforting to have him here – John has been Sherlock’s anchor, his lodestone since the moment he moved into 221B and began rearranging Sherlock’s life without even knowing it. His presence is gravity – Sherlock cannot fly apart while he is in John’s orbit.

“It does get better,” John says eventually. “It takes a while, and I still get them occasionally, but… Mine started to get better within a day of meeting you, so… I’ll be here. Maybe it won’t be easy or quick for you, with the… injury and all, but what I am trying to say is that you don’t have to do it on your own.”

Has John not been having nightmares about the pool? While Sherlock is paralysed most by the near-loss of John and the unveiling of his reasons for that fear, has John been able to put the ordeal of being kidnapped and nearly killed by a madman behind him? Or has Sherlock just been too caught up in himself to notice? Is this further evidence of how emotionally compromised he is? How  _ broken _ ?

He doesn’t want to talk about the pool, but he does want to talk about why  _ John _ hasn’t talked about it other than in passing, random snippets, but he would never know how to initiate such a conversation. There are many questions he has about John Watson that begin with  _ why _ .

They lie in the dark, not touching or even facing each other, both lost in their own reflections it would seem. The sound of passing traffic is muffled at the back of the house, but in the quiet Sherlock can hear each vehicle that passes, the neighbourhood cats making a ruckus and the muffled creaks and whines of the house as it settles.

“Do you want me to go?” John murmurs after a few more minutes of stillness.

Sherlock doesn’t need to give that any thought and he reaches out his good arm on instinct and fumbles for John’s hands to give them a pat that he hopes John will interpret as ‘please stay’. But as Sherlock touches and aligns his grasp, John lifts his hand and twines it with Sherlock’s, twisting his palm to lace their fingers together, and their joined hands fall to the covers between them where they stay as they both fall back to sleep.

>>>>><<<<<

It is still early when Sherlock wakes again. The sun hasn’t even begun to rise but the darkness has been succeeded by translucence that changes its quality as it outlines the curtains in his bedroom window. His ribs ache, as they always do after staying in one position for too long but it takes him a moment to remember what the unfamiliar sensations are – John’s rhythmic breathing, the little catches in his throat as he exhales, the heat of another body in proximity to his own and the scent of John’s shampoo made stronger by the warmth of his scalp against Sherlock’s pillows. 

They have moved during the night; John lies on his side facing the door, and Sherlock has angled his body in behind him. They are not touching but close enough to feel the way their skin warms the air between them. It would be so simple to put out a hand and touch John – if Sherlock did it gently, it might not even wake him. He could touch his shoulders, his neck, his back, his hair, and John would sleep on and never need to know. And if he woke, then Sherlock could tell him it was an accident, a mistake born of the confusion of being adrift somewhere between sleep and wakefulness.

More than ever, it overwhelms him with anger that he cannot speak to John, cannot ask what is happening between them, can’t inquire what it all  _ means.  _ This is  _ John _ – there has never been anyone like him in Sherlock’s life. It’s as if Sherlock suddenly came alive that day at Barts and that everything that came before was a distraction to while away the time until John arrived. He’s never known what it was like to be able to rely on someone, to be able to trust someone. In return for John’s friendship, Sherlock has discovered how to consider another’s feelings – admittedly he’s still working on it even now, but from thirty plus years of protective egoism and learned selfishness, he feels he has made more progress in the months with John than ever before. Having had the last week of recovery to think about it, Sherlock can scarcely believe that his voice has deserted him now that he has so much he wants to say.

He wants to tell John about the dreams he’s had – not the nightmares about the pool but the gardens, the conversations they shared, the rainy afternoons when Sherlock would spend hours lost in John’s kisses and touches.  _ I dreamed of you _ , he wants to tell John. Now, in the dark, his lips attempt to shape the soundless words slowly and deliberately, savouring the feel of them, relishing the stretch of long vowels. He feels safe, knowing that John is sleeping. There’s nothing he can say to a sleeping man that will bring his world abruptly crashing down around his ears. He breathes the scent of John, taking it deep into his lungs and letting it warm him from inside. It is entirely fanciful to imagine the amount of atoms that have touched John which are now being absorbed into Sherlock’s body through respiration, but Sherlock finds the idea calming. He exhales equally as slowly, ghosting the John-soaked breath over his tongue and lips as they curl and stroke over the shapes of the words.  _ I dreamed of you. _

To his surprise, the words form, and whispered as they are, they still emerge whole. It’s like a hairline crack in a dam, the words well along the seam of it, slowly, slowly until enough gathers to drip down. And it doesn’t stop, the drip doesn’t slow – now it has found a path and reached an unstated critical volume, it dribbles, small but steady. The weight of the water is behind it, urgent and massive but the dribble has to develop before it can become a trickle, a rivulet, a flow, a stream, a cascade, a flood. Time and energy are commodities that Sherlock has always had, patience is one he has had to learn. 

He bows his head, closes his eyes and imagines the drip eroding the dam, imagines the way the water finds a path through, and not just one, but several, finding the places where there is a weakness, an imperfection that gives it a place to begin carving a way through. 

“I dreamed... of you,” Sherlock whispers to John’s back as he sleeps. Rudimentary but functional, his voice complies in fractured phrases. All those therapists were useless because they couldn’t have offered him the right words to do this. The right phrases had to gather momentum and have purpose, take shape first as ideas before they could be expressed. His brain has recovered sufficiently for him to speak short sentences, perhaps his heart can recover enough to find the courage to give them meaning

“I h...heard you. You… saved… me.”

Over and over he speaks these simple phrases. They scrape past the impasse in his throat, bringing tears pricking to his eyes. And each time he breathes in, he seeks another way around; softer, harder, eyes closed, eyes open, end of the breath, start of the breath. Anxiety floods and ebbs like the sea and he cannot imagine being able to control it any more than he could hold back the tide with his hands.

He still tries.

His words never get louder than an exhale, but it’s a start.


	9. An Inspector Calls

Despite the dreams, Sherlock sleeps for longer than the allotted five hours and even longer than John’s proposed seven. He is disappointed but unsurprised when John is gone from his bed when he wakes once more. 

The sun has strengthened enough to call it daylight now. Sherlock drags himself out of bed and showers with care – as best he can with his shoulder and collarbone still mending and some of the wounds with removed stitches still not completely healed. He puts on clean pyjamas, then follows the noise of the kettle and tea-making into the kitchen.

John is as good as his word and delivers the promised egg on toast with a quirk of his eyebrow which seems to invite comment, but Sherlock decides to ignore that and eats most of the offering with good grace while John watches him over his paper from the opposite side of the breakfast table. Normally the look of approbation on John’s face would have earned him a scowl and a scathing text comment but, in the absence of any other sign that they slept most of the previous night in the same bed, Sherlock finds himself leaning in to it.

“More tea?” John asks, but doesn’t look up from his plate.

Sherlock pushes his mug towards John, who pretends not to notice. Trying to be clever and subtle, then.

“No?” John checks, meticulously avoiding a glance at Sherlock’s expression. He gets up and walks to the counter, his back to Sherlock who huffs and snatches up his mug. He pushes himself to his feet and pointedly places his mug beside John’s to await boiling water.

John looks at him, eyebrows raised expectantly and encouragingly.

It’s Sherlock's turn to avert his gaze. He’s not going to gamble his heart on one success. He may have whispered to John’s sleeping form early this morning, but in the uncaring light of day and with John’s hopeful face to disappoint, he cannot,  _ will not _ risk it.

John takes their mugs and puts teabags in them, letting his forearm brush against Sherlock’s briefly. Comfort. Sympathy. Understanding. 

John has decided to continue gently trying to encourage Sherlock to make an attempt to speak, then. It’s a relief – Sherlock has been expecting and dreading confrontation over the topic. He is intrigued that he finds John’s efforts touching rather than annoying. Anyone else’s attentions would have sent him into an indignant temper, but John’s eyes are always forgiving and he hopes his own reflect the regret and apology that he feels when he inevitably fails to respond. 

They clear the table together and leave the dishes in the sink as is their habit. Taking the tea, painkillers and a section of the paper each, they retire to their chairs by the fireplace and lower themselves carefully into their seats. They each catch the other’s eye during these manoeuvres and they smile at their combined struggles.

“God, we’re like a couple of old men!” John chuckles, squashing a cushion with his elbow to move its support to where he needs it.

Sherlock pulls his phone from his pocket with a grimace of discomfort and taps out a message, planting his feet to take the strain off his bruised back and protesting ribs.

**This is a temporary incapacity. We’ll soon be back in shape and ready to take on the world again.**

John smiles as he reads Sherlock’s bravado and looks up to reply. He’s very good at remembering that Sherlock’s hearing is still not completely recovered. “Maybe we could start smaller, you know? The world is quite the adversary for a first time out.”

**True enough. Perhaps climbing in and out of the bath without having to stop to catch our breath half way through is more achievable in the short term.**

“Good idea,” John agrees with a chuckle that warms Sherlock. “This week the bath – next week the world.” 

They wash down their pills with too-hot tea and John fiddles with the paper for a few minutes, clearly unable to focus before he puts it down to look at Sherlock. He seems to be wavering on whether to speak or not, but after rolling his lips into his mouth for a few seconds, he asks, “So is any more of that week coming back to you?”

Sherlock experiences a flare of irritation at John’s doggedness over this. If there’s something he needs from those opaque days, then John needs to be more precise or, better still, just tell him and stop wasting his time with these pointless quizzes. From the corner of his eye, he notices John’s sudden intensity, that he’s watching Sherlock's response to the question very closely. His attention drawn to his own reactions, Sherlock now recognises that his jaw is clenched and his hands are fisted. His breathing is erratic and with dawning disappointment, he realises that the mood swings he’d hoped were finished are something that even a genius cannot side-step. With effort, he is able to relax his muscles, take a shaky breath and let his frustration roll out with the exhalation. Too ashamed and concerned to look at John’s reaction, he tries to return to their conversation. He thinks for a few seconds about John’s simple question, sorting what he recalls from what he’s since read. 

**It’s fragmentary. Scents. Images that won’t fit in anywhere.**

“Like what?” John’s voice is normal, without censure, but Sherlock is still wary as he glances at him before replying. He need not have worried; John’s gaze is encouraging and calm.

**The train tracks. The Golem. The bald cat.**

John nods and gives Sherlock a half smile – more approval that Sherlock receives with pitiful relief.

**I remember we argued and you left. I remember watching from the window, you walking away.**

Sherlock remembers that they were debating his lack of empathy towards the victims of Moriarty’s games. This has been a recurring argument and is, for Sherlock, another example of how he has alienated John, leaving his flatmate thinking him incapable of experiencing such delicate emotions. This is not the case, and had he taken the time to elucidate it might have cleared away a lot of misunderstanding and disappointment. If there is one silver lining in the mess the last fortnight has been, then it is that John is now all too aware of the emotional responses Sherlock is capable of.

Long ago, Sherlock learned that caring was an emotion that impeded his ability to think. He remembers moments from his youth where he’d utterly failed to overcome the maelstrom of feelings, leaving him confused, vulnerable and unable to function. It had taken a lot of discipline and practice to rise above his base sentiments, suppressing the instinct to empathise and learning to replace compassion with clarity and efficiency. In time he became quite adept at concealing when he couldn’t entirely suppress, excelling when he could rise above it all, and it is this which disturbs John – his ability to switch off his emotional responses the better to apply his mind to an issue. John believes that Sherlock never fully reengages sentimentality even when there is no pressing problem to be solved and questions whether Sherlock has forgotten how.

John, as it turns out, might have had a point, but he does not know of the cataclysmic changes which have happened in terms of Sherlock’s thinking. He doesn’t know, because Sherlock has yet to trust himself sufficiently to demonstrate.

He second-guesses himself now regarding the way he’d phrased things regarding John’s departure from the flat after their harsh words. Now that he’s sent the text to him he's not certain at all whether revealing his turmoil over John’s behaviour was a good thing to share, but he gestures toward the street when John looks up. The cat is out of the bag; now, consequences must be dealt with.

If anything, John’s face falls further, but he lifts his chin and inhales quickly. He nods and now it’s his turn to avoid Sherlock’s eye. “I was… angry. I went to Sarah’s.”

Of course. It feels like months ago, but John has only recently begun seeing one of the partners at his new surgery. He’d thought that after the Chinese Circus visit that they might have cooled in their interest for each other, but apparently not.

John looks a little uncomfortable now. “We’re not… I spoke to her about taking all this time off and we’ve decided that it isn’t such a good idea for us to be… anything more.” John doesn’t try to hide his expression. He looks fine and… not relieved but something like it, Sherlock thinks. 

**I’m sorry,** he types. 

John smiles reassuringly when he reads it and shrugs with a wince. “Don’t be. It wasn’t anything serious,” he assures Sherlock. 

John’s infatuations rarely are. He seems to bounce back from break-ups and refusals with apparent ease, so much so that Sherlock has had to focus to keep up with them.

“So, nothing new?” John asks carefully, steering the conversation away from him. “No resurfacing memories?”

**Maybe if you tell me again it will help me to understand.**

“It’s better if you remember on your own. I don’t want you to take my memories and imagine that they are your own. You’ve read the reports; I’m sure you have an idea from those about the order in which things happened.”

**Your insight might give me a more rounded picture than the reports. Your thoughts. The things you noticed.**

“What, and inflict my opinions on an unsuspecting audience?” John says, raising his eyebrows.

Sherlock frowns. John’s intonation is teasing but there is a flicker of heat behind it. Is this a conversation they’ve had before?

“Ignore me,” John mutters running a hand through his hair and glancing at Sherlock from the corner of his eye. 

Lifting his mobile, Sherlock tries to decide how to pursue this without scaring John off. There’s something here, he’s sure of it.

“Yoo Hoo! Are you boys decent?”

Mrs Hudson reverses into the room , pushing the door open with her bottom, carrying a plate of flapjacks in one hand and the morning’s mail in the other. 

Heart plummeting at the same time as sneaking relief trickles through him, Sherlock watches as John leaps up to relieve their landlady of her burdens. 

“How are you feeling today, Sherlock? You still look a bit peaky,” Mrs Hudson says in a voice loud enough to be heard in Knightsbridge. Clearly John has told her about the damage to his hearing but has neglected to tell her that it was temporary and is now almost completely recovered.

Sherlock reassures her with a tight but polite smile.

“Oh, that’s good. John was ever so worried, weren’t you dear? Couldn’t persuade him to even come back here to sleep, you know. Should have been in a hospital bed of his own, really, but he wouldn’t have it.”

“Had to make sure he didn’t terrorise any of the medical staff once he was awake,” John explains a little too quickly. 

**Mycroft paid them extra to cover that possibility, I’m sure,** Sherlock types and John relays it to Mrs Hudson who gives him a twinkly, damp smile.

“Well, I’m glad to see you both up and about. Don’t know what we’d have done without you around, Sherlock. What’s the world coming to? Consulting criminals and playing with people’s lives like that. It’s a terrible state of affairs. Doesn’t bear thinking about if John hadn’t been there with you.”

“Shall I put the kettle on?” John asks into the uncomfortable silence that follows while their landlady tuts in blissful ignorance.

“Oh, thanks dear, but no. I just popped up to bring you the flapjacks. I’m off to get my hair done now.” She glances unsubtly at the neatly shaved area of Sherlock’s head extending from over his left eye towards the back of his skull . John clears his throat and their landlady flutters back into action. 

“I think that explosion turned my hair white overnight. Such a mess it was in here.”

She looks around helplessly at the clutter they have already produced in just a few days, then pats at her scalp self-consciously as she disappears out of the door.

Mrs Hudson’s skill as a catalyst for uncomfortable silences is clearly undiminished. Sherlock wonders, not for the first time, whether some of her blunt commentary isn’t deliberately planted.

John’s cheeks are pinkened from her praises. “Well, I need more tea,” he asserts and he moves into the kitchen to start clattering about with mugs and sugar, covering his discomfort with the familiar ritual.

Damn Hudders and her uncanny knack of pinpointing the most inopportune moments to visit, Sherlock thinks as he wonders whether he would be welcome if he were to follow John into the kitchen. 

The doorbell rings and Sherlock scowls, listening to Mrs Hudson intercept the visitor on her way out of the building. John is already pulling down another mug and by the time Lestrade walks into the sitting room, he has the kettle almost boiled and a welcoming smile on his face.

“Morning, gents,” Lestrade gruffs. 

Sherlock can tell the D.I. is wary about how he might find him, this being the first time he has seen him since he came home from the hospital, but Lestrade is covering it well.

**Hello Graham** , Sherlock texts.  **Have you ruined London in my absence?**

Lestrade’s eyes bounce up from his phone to Sherlock’s waiting gaze. Clearly he’d been hoping that the reports about Sherlock’s speech difficulties were exaggerated. 

“Not quite,” he sighs and pulls a chair over from the desk to make a triangle of their seating arrangement. “So, how are you feeling now?” he asks, taking Sherlock’s bored glare in his stride and turning his attention to John.

“Yeah, he’s fine,” John replies. “These things take time, but everyone is optimistic that we’re on the right path.”

“So you can write but not…” Lestrade turns to him again but Sherlock flops back on his chair and looks at the ceiling.

“Yeah, it’s… complicated,” John explains. His smile is false, a veneer over a warning of being provoked further. Protective.

Sherlock directs a sharp glance at him; he doesn’t want John thinking he needs such protections just from words. Why is he trying to spare Sherlock’s blushes? Does he not think that Lestrade can follow the medical reasoning behind his aphasia? Or does he have doubts about Sherlock’s diagnosis and subsequent progress? John is not as much of an idiot as Sherlock likes to point out – it’s entirely possible that the man has put together Sherlock’s lack of speech and the evidence from the specialists and come up short.

‘Complicated’ is an interesting word to choose, though. Sherlock has been blown up in an explosion at a swimming pool, in which John saved his life by tackling them both into the water and away from the worst of the destruction. An injury to Sherlock’s head has led to Broca’s aphasia making it hard for him to control what he says or how he says it and so, in an effort to avoid declaring his hopeless devotion to John which he discovered in a lucid mind-palace excursion, he has given up speaking altogether.

Not complicated at all, but only if one is privy to all the facts. 

“How about you, John? Heard you’d taken a bit of a beating too,” Lestrade asks.

John nods awkwardly. “Getting there. Neither of us are as young as we used to be.”

Lestrade nods in return, smiling in commiseration. “Isn’t that the truth? Well, it’s been quiet without you boys around.”

Sherlock rolls his eyes. He’s hardly a boy anymore, and what Lestrade means is that things have settled down since Moriaty and several of his henchmen were crushed to death by part of the swimming pool roof when Sherlock deliberately set off a bomb.

“Missing you down at the Yard,” the detective inspector continues.

**Got some missing cat cases that you just can’t crack?**

Lestrade’s smile is resigned as he reads the message. “I see your sparkling personality hasn’t been affected.”

Sherlock deliberately shuts off his phone and drops it over the side of his chair onto a pile of newspapers. He dismisses the exasperated look on John’s face by closing his eyes.

“Just ignore him. He’s a terrible patient. It was good of you to pop round. Do you want a cuppa while you’re here?”

“No, I’d better get back. Thanks, though. Just wanted to see how you both were and wish you a speedy recovery. Wondered if his highness was bored enough to want me to bring him some cold case files.”

Sherlock opens his eyes, sighs as if he’s surrounded by more idiots than usual and refuses to engage.

Cases mean talking.  _ Shouldn’t _ speak has turned to  _ mustn’t  _ speak which has become  _ cannot  _ speak. Too self-conscious. Too afraid to say the wrong thing. People pay attention to him more now that he’ll only text or scribble notes. This is convenient. This is easy. 

This silence is a lie by omission.

“Why not?” John shrugs with a long suffering glare. “Bring them over, Greg. Pointing out how stupid people are usually cheers him up.”

Lestrade snorts at that and stands again. “Well, these cats aren’t going to find themselves,” he says with a sour look at Sherlock. “Take care of yourselves and let us know if there’s anything I can do to help.”

Reaching down, Sherlock picks up his phone without looking.

**What could that possibly be? Have you adopted advanced neuroscience as a hobby?**

Lestrade walks to the door and turns, having read the text with a huff. “Don't worry, I know my way out. And John?”

John looks at the detective inspector, his head tipped.

“From what I hear, you had a bit of a rough time of it even before he decided to make a hole in Wandsworth. If you ever want to go and get a drink…”

John murmurs a thank you, and Lestrade nods shortly, disappearing back down the stairs with a heavy tread. 


	10. One Word

John won’t catch Sherlock’s eye as he passes him and heads back into the kitchen. Sherlock can feel the hundred questions he wants to ask like a mouthful of soil. His very tongue feels choking and too solid, becoming more dense with his desire to speak and not allowing him to catch enough breath to even begin. He wrestles with his choice; without his voice, he allows _John’s_ silence too. This is a piece of puzzle he hadn’t even known about, but now he does, he needs it immediately; why is John so uncomfortable suddenly?

He pockets his phone and bounces up from his chair with a short hiss, following John into the kitchen and catching him by the bicep. John resists being turned, but pauses long enough for Sherlock to angle himself so he can see into his shuttered face. 

It takes an age for John’s gaze to make the journey up to Sherlock’s. He tugs at John’s sleeve urgently, frowning when John simply shakes his head.

“I just… it’s not right, implying any of this was your fault. I just remembered something when Greg said that. He… Moriarty… he was just trying to get inside my head.” John passes his palm over his mouth and takes a deliberate, slow breath. “They grabbed me off the street and sedated me. When I woke up, he was there, waiting for me. I’m sure it was in the report you saw. He… he wanted me to be the instrument of your downfall. He was so excited by it being a friend, someone you cared for as the reason for your death. He wanted you to think I’d betrayed you and… When you turned up and saw me first… you believed, you really thought that I...”

Sherlock jerks at John's arm again. This wasn’t in any of the recounts he’s seen, not in this context at least. There’s more to this, but John’s eyes skitter away and Sherlock growls in frustration, his breaths hitching as he tries to howl past the stupid, irrational idiocy that prevents him from questioning John more closely. That it’s his own mind that is stealing away his words is humiliating and infuriating.

John turns then and reaches out a hand so they are both grasping each other.

“It’s okay. Sherlock, shhh! It’s okay,” John soothes.

Sherlock realises that his eyes are swimming with furious tears. Damned erratic emotions. 

John gives his bicep a squeeze. “Just breathe, okay? I’m here. We’re okay. We’re both okay.” His free hand grabs Sherlock by his good shoulder and he deftly turns them both, steering them back to the sitting room and down onto the sofa. He puts an arm around Sherlock and lets him lean in against his side. 

“It’s over, okay? All finished,” John repeats like a mantra. “We’re fine. We’re fine.”

He needed this reminder, Sherlock realised, struggling to douse the frustration and stop the tears. He has to keep his emotions in check. This is why silence is his only safety.

>>>>><<<<<

For the rest of the day a sense of discomfort lingers in the flat. John does his best to inject some conversation into proceedings but his efforts trail off into quiet repeatedly. Sherlock naps on the sofa and eats his soup when John brings it to him at suppertime but pointedly avoids the sliced apples and the ill-advised cheese sandwich delivered to him at lunch time. 

By nine that evening, Sherlock has had enough. After the emotion of this morning and a day of watching John while avoiding being caught doing so, Sherlock wants nothing more than to hide in his darkening bedroom. 

John doesn’t look surprised when Sherlock indicates that he’s going to bed, just asks if he needs any help. His shoulders drop as he gives Sherlock a quick wave before he shuts his bedroom door. 

Sherlock is relieved to remove his hated sling but hates the ache in his shoulder when he props his arm on the pillows John has placed there for that purpose. Hovering uncomfortably on the edge of sleep, Sherlock dozes but never quite tips over. The thought of John in Moriarty’s hands is bitter like bile in his throat. Was it what he had said to him that was making John watch Sherlock as if he were something to be feared? What cruelty did John have to endure even before he was strapped into a vest of explosives? 

He’s reminded of how far his recovery has come when he clearly hears John’s steps in the hallway at around half past ten. His eardrum must be nearly or fully intact. He listens to John visiting the bathroom to relieve himself and brush his teeth. Then, his flatmate goes up to bed. The stairs creak unevenly to his limping gait, and Sherlock follows the sounds in his mind’s eye, relishing how he can now make out the click of his watch on the dresser, the dull chink of coins from his pocket, the dry crackle of the wicker laundry hamper, the drawers for clean pyjamas, and finally the sigh and squeak of John settling onto his mattress. Unlike before, there is a bittersweet nature to these sounds. He used to find John’s bedtime routine strangely reassuring but now it just serves to remind Sherlock of the distance between them that doesn’t seem to be closing at all.

At midnight, Sherlock gives up on sleep. The solitude of his room feels now more oppressive than reassuring, and he’s on his feet before he’s even thought through what he’s doing. He makes his way quietly up to the bedroom above his own. John rarely closes either his blinds or the door of his room and Sherlock can make out the shape of him on his side. On silent feet he moves closer to a spot where he can see John’s face. The ambient light from outside washes across the room and outlines John’s jaw and the curve of his brow. Sleep has lifted the worry from him making him look younger. Sherlock wonders if he is overstepping some line of John’s devising by being here. He thinks it likely but cannot persuade himself to go. He sits awkwardly with his back to the wall and matches his breath to John’s. 

“Sherlock?”

He must have dozed off momentarily – the moon has risen far enough to be seen through the skylight now, casting it’s cold silver over the bed and a bright square of carpet. John’s eyes are dark against the pallor of his skin. Raised on an elbow, his voice and movements are careful in order not to alarm Sherlock. He watches for a moment but doesn’t ask. He lifts the corner of his duvet and when Sherlock doesn’t move he folds it back, shifts some pillows across for him and scoots himself further away. He lies back down and closes his eyes, settling down to sleep. 

It takes ten minutes for his heartbeat to settle, for his body to accept what his mind already has – that his presence here is allowed. He understands this is kindness and nothing more, but as he shuffles in beside John, the warmth of the duvet reminds him how cold he had felt alone downstairs. 

John sighs and within minutes he is still again, breathing evenly and Sherlock feels the words he’s struggled with balanced on his tongue, clean like the moonlight.

“John,” he mouths, breathing into the shape of it. “Sorry. I… I’m sorry.” 

He wants to say more because there is so much to say if he could only say it safely, but these seem to be the only words that he can speak with any confidence. Tears prick his eyes but don’t fall as he presses the words into the air around John’s sleeping body hoping that some of them might break through into his dreams.

>>>>><<<<<

Sherlock wakes, gritty-eyed and drunk with the lack of sleep. It’s ridiculous how his body remains weakened after the incident. 

The sky has only just begun to pale. He could lay here and relish John’s presence for a few moments more, but his mind is already buzzing restlessly and he knows that to stay will only frustrate him further.

He rises quietly and takes himself to his own room without waking John. On his bedside table is the faded hardback copy of an anthology of Taylor-Coleridge’s work, well cared for but clearly old. It is a familiar weight in his hands and the pages are pleasingly thin and soft between his fingertips as the book falls open to past favourites. John must have put it there when Sherlock came home from the hospital.

Regardless of their current communication issues, Sherlock is confused by what kind of a man would sit at a friend’s bedside for days on end, reading to him as he lay sedated and convalescing from a head injury, then continue as if nothing had happened when they return to their normal cohabiting routines. Surely this was an act of devotion to wait hour after hour for him to wake, and even when he had, to remain there once the immediate danger had passed and Sherlock’s consciousness had returned. He only recalls short periods of John’s absence, and even those were often to provide Sherlock with something he craved. 

Since they have been home, John has been looking at him with poorly concealed confusion. He’s kept his distance and Sherlock cannot see what has happened to have made this devoted friend at his bedside become the wary, often distant man he’s sharing a flat with. Could he be fearing that some of Sherlock’s current infirmity might be permanent, and he doesn’t wish to saddle himself with someone so much less than the man Sherlock had been before the explosion? It hasn’t occurred to him to wonder before now how dependent his brilliance is on its verbal expression.

He puts down the book and sighs, pushing his good hand through his hair in frustration. 

“Sherlock?”

He hasn’t heard John follow him down the stairs, distracted and tired as he is. He turns his head to show him he’s listening.

“Are you…? Is everything alright?”

Sherlock twists on the bed so he can look at him. Standing in the doorway, John is underlining everything that has Sherlock so off-balance. He hovers on the threshold as if uncertain of his welcome. His eyes are full of worry, like the lines of his brow and around his mouth. But beyond the concern for a friend is that underlying apprehension that he’s been noticing lately. 

Sherlock turns his head away, shaking it a little. His cracked rib complains as he shifts his shoulders and he holds his breath, waiting for the pain to pass. He hopes John’s won’t misinterpret this suspended quiet as something else.

“Did you have nightmares again?” John asks gently.

From the corner of his eye Sherlock can see him edging closer. Perhaps it is the frustration of their stunted conversations or the lingering aches of his injuries, but Sherlock finds himself overwhelmed out of nowhere. He sits carefully on his rumpled bed and tries to hold his crumbling sense of self together by strength of will alone.

It takes over a minute, but John gradually closes the gap between them and lays a hand on Sherlock’s good shoulder. He must see something broken in Sherlock’s expression when he tips his head up to look at him, because his barriers seem to crumble for an instant. He sits close beside him and puts an arm around his shoulders, inviting him in with a cautious pull.

It’s an exquisite sort of torture that what Sherlock craves the most compromises him the most. John’s attention. John’s proximity. John’s touch. He wants to tell the man to keep away, but he wants to tell him never to let go even more. He doesn’t know what he wants, and makes a strained noise. John smells of sleepy warmth and home and Sherlock’s shampoo where they shared a pillow, and it’s too much and not nearly enough. Sherlock turns into John’s shoulder, puts his arms around John’s body and hangs on tightly.

“It’s okay. You’ll be alright,” John tells him quietly. “These things take time.”

He sits still while Sherlock consolidates his hold on him, threading the fabric of John’s t-shirt between his fists. John responds with a warm palm sweeping up and down his upper arm. Sherlock's forehead rests firmly on his shoulder and the solidness of his friend is a comfort and a torment. Sherlock rolls his head against John and his nose crushes against the baggy collar of John’s sleep shirt and the skin of his neck. A sensory recollection jerks him, his body and mind suddenly flooded with the immediacy of the man’s presence, just like in his mind palace. Sherlock knows that none of what he remembers is real, but that’s not how those fabricated memories feel. He recalls how John’s laugh, rushing air against his mouth had felt so warm, how John’s weight on his chest had been so grounding and right, how John’s jaw beneath his lips and the pattern of his stubble had felt like home. Being with John had made him feel comfortable in his skin; cherished. The memories are joyful and diamond-bright. He inhales the scent of John and remembers nothing short of _love_.

Lost between that world and the real one he longs to reject, Sherlock does the only thing he can think of to keep the memory there and kisses the skin of John’s throat with a deep and reverent exultation.

The reaction is instantaneous.

John pulls back to look at Sherlock with an expression the latter has never seen before and cannot even begin to pick apart. All that he knows is that it is not unequivocally delighted.

Something inside Sherlock turns to ice. It wasn’t his words, in the end, that betrayed him. All of him, body and mind, have become so attuned, so infatuated with John that perhaps… perhaps this was inevitable.

It’s still an utter disaster. It’s the last moment of his life with John and the first without him. It has to be.

“Sherlock,” John says with infinite gentleness and regret. In an instant, the realisation comes that John must think this is just another consequence of the injury. That it’s not real.

No. No no no no. _NO!_

Sherlock shakes his head like a madman as John stands and pulls himself carefully from Sherlock’s grasp, stepping out of arm’s reach. He dives for his phone but John is already turning away, his hand pressed to his mouth. 

This cannot be allowed to happen… this is… what has he done? John is talking now and Sherlock forces himself to listen. 

“... don’t worry… it’s… it will be fine. I shouldn’t have… This is not your fault, okay? Sometimes when you’ve had a head injury it takes time for things to come back to you, I mean, for a person to start behaving normally.”

John is rounding the bed and walking backwards towards the door as he speaks. His hands are raised before him, palms to Sherlock in a warding gesture. 

Sherlock thinks he might vomit.

“You’re confused right now. You’re not yourself. It’s… when your frontal lobe gets knocked around...” John soothes.

_No!_

This could not be any worse. In an instant of utter idiocy, not only has he alerted John to his attraction but he has also managed to convince John that said attraction has been caused by his head injury playing tricks with him. His own worst case scenario has been realised and surpassed – with John aware of his feelings for him, he had hoped for an answer, one way or another; whether they could ever be anything more than friends. Now he is none the wiser _and_ facing the prospect of persuading John that his feelings are real and of long-standing, and not the product of damage to his brain.

Sherlock jumps onto the bed, walks across it, ignoring the pain from unhealed injuries and flooded by a new, breath-stealing ache. He puts himself between John and the bedroom door, his back hitting it harder than he had imagined. His body protests as it echoes the creak and shudder of the old wood.

Sherlock’s fingers won’t comply as quickly as he would wish as he attempts to force a soliloquy into as fewer words as possible on his phone keypad.

“Move, Sherlock,” John says quietly but firmly in a voice Sherlock recognises as meaning business. John’s face is flushed and his gaze is steady but Sherlock can only spare a glance and a quick shake of his head as he tries to type with shaking hands. 

John is standing two metres away and Sherlock has a sudden recollection of how others who have squared off against Captain Watson have fared. He doesn’t look immediately threatening, but the possibility is there should it become necessary, and Sherlock presses send before John can ask him to move again.

There is a muffled chime from the room above his. Of course John doesn’t have his phone on him – he’s in his pyjamas! Sherlock thrusts his own phone at John who considers him levelly for a few long seconds before he takes it.

“Forgive you?” John reads. “Sherlock, there’s nothing to forgive. That’s what I’m saying. You’re not thinking straight right now, so I have to be the one to keep a level head. I wouldn’t want you to do something you’ll regret when you’re completely recovered. Your friendship means too much to me to…”

Sherlock covers his face with both hands and groans aloud. 

“Look.” John’s voice is beginning to lose its patient smoothness. “This isn’t you,” he asserts. “We’re close, best friends and you’re confusing that with… I don’t know…” John can’t find the right word and gestures towards the bed in frustration. “It’s not your fault. Your injury…”

Sherlock shakes his head all the way through John’s little speech. He hates the condescension in it, the assumption that Sherlock never would or could want something like this if he was in his right mind. That it’s a mistake he’s made inadvertently. 

He quickly snatches back the phone when John finally dries up.

“No? What’s no?” John huffs. There’s something uncomfortably close to pity in his voice when he speaks. “You think you’re attracted to me but believe me, you’re not. Think, Sherlock! You don’t do this. You’ve never been interested in… You’re ‘married to your work’, do you remember that? Relationships ‘aren’t your area’? When those explosives went up you suffered a significant head injury that caused trauma to your brain, scrambling everything up. It hasn’t even been a fortnight since that injury. You are not behaving in a manner that might be called characteristic for you. The fact that you, _you_ who could out-talk the entire bloody House of Commons, are being _quiet_. That should tell you all you need to know. And that’s okay. It’s not your fault. I understand.”

John has it all backwards! He is completely mistaken about the laws of cause and effect in this situation. Sherlock's fingers simply will not type fast enough or eloquently enough. He’s trying to refute every erroneous point in John’s argument and make him understand that this isn’t about brain injury - this isn’t impairment; it’s _enhancement_. It’s about him seeing clearly for the first time how very vital John is to him. Fire and brimstone have rained upon them and revealed his priorities, not diminished him – at least not in the way that John thinks. He sees John not as a blogger or an assistant or a flatmate, but as a partner, an object of affection, a loved one. It’s not that Sherlock didn’t know John’s importance in his life, it’s just that he hadn’t recognised the scope of that importance before now, nor had he considered the potential of being courageous enough to accept all of it. 

The frustration is making his head ache and his heart lurch in his chest. He looks up when John falls silent and is dismayed to see him moving to the door to the bathroom, letting himself out into the hallway. Sherlock scrambles after him, brandishing the phone at him when he catches him up in the kitchen.

John sighs but takes the phone. His face tightens miserably as he reads, and he carries Sherlock’s mobile with him as he limps into the sitting room, clearly giving himself time to marshal another argument. Sherlock follows, words thick and cloying in his throat.

“This is nothing to do with…” John turns and seems surprised to find Sherlock only a step behind him. “Look, it doesn’t matter what you’ve deduced about me. Yes, I read to you in the hospital. Yes, I stayed with you, but none of that is relevant to this argument. We are talking about _you_. If you’d had… feelings… for me, before Moriarty…”

Sherlock nods frantically and fears that if his pulse gets any louder in his ears, he will lose his hearing again. He makes a grab for the phone, but John keeps it, holding it out of Sherlock’s reach and talking over his frustrated growls. 

“If you’d shown any interest at all… but you didn’t.” John holds up an admonishing finger as Sherlock reaches again for his phone. “You didn’t! That’s how I know that this is purely a symptom of your neurological recovery and that is also why I’m not going to let you do this because in another month you will regret it and it will have messed up things between us. Wait and see, Sherlock! And if you’re wondering, I am never going to mention this situation again. Ever. Okay?”

John could not be more wrong. His logic is flawed. He hasn’t got all the data he needs. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Sherlock may not have declared his affection to John but even Mycroft had recognised his deep connection to the doctor, dispensing thinly veiled warnings of the dangers of attachment on repeated occasions. Sherlock may not have stated his devotion or attraction but it had been implied in dozens of ways every day if John had only known where to look and if Sherlock had stopped to notice.

His cheeks flushed with exertion and vehemence, John’s voice is growing loud and cracking, showing the strain of trying to be patient. “What you think you're feeling right now is not real and I can’t let you risk our friendship for something you will be able to delete and I won’t!”

Sherlock finally wrests the mobile from John’s grasp and in helpless fury, hurls it across the room.

The clatter of a several hundred pound’s worth of plastic and glass landing badly is like harsh punctuation. They stand face to face, breathing hard in the cool, quiet air of their untidy sitting room. The pale light of morning feels as fragile as their friendship, right now.

For a moment, everything is frozen. The distance between them is immeasurably more than the few inches that separate them. They are divided by mistrust and fear and bitter experience. Somehow Sherlock must reach across all of this, cut through their arguments and counter-arguments, and connect. And all without the asset of his voice.

Although... 

Sherlock closes his eyes to avoid witnessing the anguish in John’s. He needs to be calm for this or else he risks adding fuel to John’s allegation about the state of his psyche. He pulls in breath after forced breath and pushes them out slowly, willing his frustrations out with them. As he gradually calms, he reaches out with both hands, gently taking John by the shoulders. John’s body is rigid and unyielding, but he allows it, and Sherlock maintains their connection despite the reluctant welcome. 

As his breathing settles, Sherlock moulds a word in his mind. He considers how it would shape the breath, how he might breathe it into John’s consciousness. He knows John won’t stay for long like this; he has often demonstrated his preference for ‘a bit of air’ when Sherlock has tried his patience too far and he predicts with ninety-six per cent certainty that it will be John’s next move. 

Slowly, slowly he leans into John who stiffens further beneath Sherlock’s hands. But Sherlock bows his head gradually and as obviously as he can to rest his forehead against the top of John’s scalp.

The other John would have reached for him by now, the other John would have tilted his head back, would have bumped their noses, would have smiled while Sherlock brushed their lips together, inciting him into further kisses. He would have hummed his pleasure into Sherlock’s mouth. He would have curled his arms around Sherlock’s waist, pulled him close and given him no cause to doubt the incredible depth of his love.

But this isn’t that John. 

Yet.

That John is still a theory, hypothesised and predicted – he is a possibility, nothing more. There are numerous similarities that, if he’s correct, will urge John down the path that Sherlock is hoping for, things that Sherlock had noted but ignored in the months they have lived together – hell, things from the first conversation they had, the first meal, the first cab journey, but John has had months to change and grow away from the man that he was. Sherlock has to get this right – it might be too late already, it could backfire horribly and end with him losing this John forever; his friendship, his companionship, his support, his help, his admiration. He might well end up with nothing. But, Sherlock is certain that the risk is worth the reward – only just, but even so. He can’t go back to living the way they were, not now he knows what they could be.

The real, tangible John in his grasp is thrumming with discomfort and alarm and surprising sadness, but Sherlock holds the word in his mind and breathes its shape into the silence. He doesn’t have enough words to explain – he wouldn’t if he had every word in every language and a year to use them all. If he does this right and he has chosen the right word, then it will be the only one he needs. He takes a breath and carefully pushes the single word into his exhalation and into John’s hair. 

“Please.”

John’s breath hitches and his chin lifts to look at Sherlock. Relief and confusion and concern play across his face but they resolve into regret within a few seconds. He takes a breath to reply, but Sherlock gives him a tiny shake and tries one more time. 

“Please,” he whispers, staring into John’s searching eyes, willing him to understand, to give him a chance. 

_Please believe what I'm telling you. Please trust me one more time._

_Please want this as much as I do._ _Please show me that I wasn’t wrong, imagining us like this._


	11. Picking Your Battles

“Please… J… John.”

The sound of his name makes John’s jaw jump and he presses his lips together tightly. Sherlock waits and watches as John finally nods jerkily, resigned to comply. He won’t meet his gaze anymore, his eyes fixed on Sherlock’s shoulder.

Sherlock’s heart thuds erratically again, his stomach a tumbling mess of sensation as he cups John’s jaw with his hands and lifts his face to press a chaste, hesitant kiss to his mouth. John flinches and tenses so hard that Sherlock fears he might bolt. With nothing to lose, Sherlock tries again. The gentlest nudge of his lips to John’s seems to invoke no response for the longest time, but there, finally, John’s mouth softens and Sherlock deepens the kiss. He sucks softly at John’s bottom lip, remembering exactly how that felt when the other John used to do the same to him, how intimate and how cherished it would make him feel. If John recognises some of his own technique, he doesn’t show it, but allows Sherlock a fraction more access to his mouth. 

Sherlock uses every trick he can remember, everything that John showed him and shared with him on lazy afternoons on the sofa – kisses which never happened for real but happened all the same. He kisses John until their mouths are swollen and tingling. Sherlock is encouraged when John allows him to angle his face and slide their mouths together and John’s hands come up slowly to hold Sherlock by his biceps. Fearing he will be pushed away, Sherlock slides his good hand around to the back of John’s neck and rubs his thumb through the short hair there, pleading without words. He need not have worried because John simply hangs on and leans in further, allowing Sherlock to slip his tongue into John’s mouth and stroke against John’s slowly, softly and deliberately.

Sherlock begins to feel quite lightheaded after a few more minutes of kissing John; breathing is utterly secondary to the point of this exercise, but he has to pull away an inch or risk falling over.

John’s eyes remain closed for a few seconds longer and he wets his lips, pulling them between his teeth as if savouring the moment. When he does open them, they are a startling, storm blue and his pupils are blown wide.

“You’d better be the bloody genius everyone says you are, Sherlock. If you’re wrong about this… if you’re wrong, if you regret this later, there’s no way back for us. We can’t… _I_ can’t go back…” This little speech is made in a harsh, half-choked whisper. His fears are writ large across his weary, honest face.

Can’t John _see?_ Can’t he see that if Sherlock cannot have this, _then_ there is no going back? 

He does the only thing that he can think of and kisses John again. He tries to pour everything that’s been trapped on his tongue into the kiss – gratitude, reassurance and resolve. It’s not sexual, it’s not possessive or demanding. And, miraculously, John seems to understand some of that because when Sherlock straightens up and watches him warily, he nods again, just once.

Leading him to the sofa and sitting him down, John is gratifyingly tractable and he stays quiet while Sherlock finds a pad and pen. There are several of each strewn around the flat and it’s the work of seconds to collect what he needs. Returning to the sofa and switching on a lamp, Sherlock hesitates. John’s eyes are following him, waiting for the explanation that Sherlock has to deliver now. But how much to tell him? How much of it does Sherlock believe himself? It doesn’t help to think about how he would react if John brought him the story he is about to tell – Sherlock would be looking for the reason why John thought such unscientific reasoning might sway him and that will bring them back to the head injury discussion again. But John is a romantic, regardless of his pragmatic career choices, and that might work in Sherlock’s favour. 

He sits on John’s left, as close as he dares and folds his legs beneath him. He can ignore the twinges and complaints from his own recovering body, but causing John pain with his thoughtlessness is something he is keen not to repeat. He leans forward and props his injured unsupported arm on his thigh and arranges the pad so he can steady it with that hand while he writes. 

**_This isn’t because of the explosion._ **

**_This isn’t new._ **

**_I’ve had a lot of time to think and reflect on the last year of our friendship. You have become important to me in ways I had not anticipated or sought. My ~~regard~~ feelings for you might come as much of a surprise as they were to me, but all the signs were there. I was simply too distracted and stupid to recognise them for what they are. I can be exceptionally single-minded and any thoughts that might have alerted me to your innumerable qualities and to my growing desire for your company were discarded as irrelevant compared to whatever case or experiment I was currently engaged in. Selfish of me, conceited, but in my defence I didn’t know any better. I have been solitary out of choice and necessity for much of my adult life. In all honesty I never expected to meet anyone who might possibly wish to change that. Someone who would welcome my companionship._ **

**_I know you think that I’m suffering from some kind of residual impairment and that I don’t know my own mind in this regard, but I can assure you that is not the case. The only effect that explosion had is that it knocked loose a truth I can no longer ignore._ **

He feels, ridiculously, like he should sign the paper even though John has his head at an angle, reading wherever he can get a line of sight. Sherlock nudges the paper around and John reaches out to tip the pad so he can see it better. He must read it through at least twice for all the time that it’s taking him and Sherlock studies his face, up close, as he does.

John looks tired. There are not just the little lines that pain etches beside his eyes and around his mouth, but a bone-deep weariness that tints his skin. Still, his attention to the words is encouraging and his expression gives away nothing of his reaction which is both impressive and profoundly irritating. Sherlock must just wait for John to speak but he cannot help ask the question to which he fears the answer as much as he desires it. 

He moves the pad back onto his hand.

**_The first time we met, I noticed that there was perhaps an attraction and, moreover, that it was mutual. In my excitement at a new case, I was tactless and blunt when you tried to discover my views on romantic relationships. I was engaged with the case, yes, but I also believed your interest would wane in direct proportion to how well you knew me and I didn’t want to feel that disappointment. I considered sentiment to be a poor replacement for the Work. In short, I was an idiot._ **

**_This is a shock, I know. I hope that I have not realised too late for you to forgive me and reconsider the future of our relationship. I ~~think~~ hope that I haven’t misunderstood the way things are between us – that you do still hold affection for me. That I might be allowed a second chance?_ **

John reads this second message, sits back and brings his eyes cautiously to Sherlock’s face and immediately away again. Sherlock cannot blink, cannot breathe for fear that he will miss some tiny tell, some indicator of which direction his argument should go in next. He has tried to use language that John might use himself, abandoning his usual emotionless idioms and tendencies. He doesn’t want to be seen to be hiding behind words or distancing himself from his own sentiments. He wants to say that John has taught him that with spontaneous touches, sympathetic words and affectionate smiles but this John might recognise that he is not talking about him. Not really. Not yet. 

“You do understand that this is exactly what you would say if you were having ongoing neurological symptoms,” John says eventually, almost as if he’s asking Sherlock to prove otherwise. “Your logic didn’t suffer, just your… inhibition and emotional processing.”

Sherlock sighs, but John holds up his hands to pause his retort.

“Try to see this from my perspective, Sherlock. My own feelings aside, your entire outlook has changed and the catalyst for that was the explosion and your injuries. You have to admit, to take it at face value, that is an incredible coincidence. I can’t just sign myself up for this new you without knowing that it really is you saying these things. Wanting… what you want.”

**_It is me._ **

**_It really is me, John._ **

**_This is not new. _ **

He underlines the last sentence twice.

John bites his bottom lip. Sherlock can tell he’s tempted to believe that Sherlock hasn’t got this wrong, prays that John remembers that he once found Sherlock worthy of love, that he was attracted to him despite his protestations to the contrary after Sherlock shot him down within hours of their first meeting. 

I’ll see any specialist you deem qualified to assess my cognitive recovery. I’m not addled, John. I’m not imagining things. I see you clearly and I understand what I want now.

John’s eyes close and he flops back against the sofa again, grunting quietly, presumably as his ribs complain. He wipes his palm over his face and rolls his head to the side to look at Sherlock directly.

“Then talk to me,” John says plainly. 

Sherlock stares at him, feeling helpless and disappointed in himself. Perhaps he should have predicted this. This is not a simple thing that John is asking for. He can feel the barriers still there despite John’s newfound understanding. It’s not easy to undo such a firm injunction, and that’s before he’s even begun to address the residual aphasia. He can’t. Not like this.

“Just… just try. It’s just me. If this isn’t you being still affected by your injury, then why...” John trails out, then grunts in frustration. “You know this isn’t quantifiable, Sherlock. They can’t look at an EEG and tell me you’re fine or not fine. These things are assessed symptomatically, through comparison to prior behaviour, and some might say that deciding after all this time living together and a lifetime of avoiding sentiment that you are suddenly…” John is clearly searching for words that don’t incriminate either of them or tie them in to patterns of behaviour that accompany such phrases.

 _In love_ , Sherlock thinks; he’s trying to avoid saying that Sherlock’s in love with him – in case he’s wrong? In case that’s not the right word? Because he doesn’t think that’s a possibility?

John sits up and sighs. “Tell me this. You refused a speech therapist and you won’t see that neuropsychologist they recommended. From your scans and your diagnosis profile you… there’s no reason for… You ought to be making more progress with your speech by now. Mycroft told me about when you were a child, um––”

John seems to anticipate the negative reaction this statement produces and puts his hand on Sherlock’s arm to calm him.

Sherlock flails, wanting to delete the last ten seconds of his life. Meddling bastard brother! Why does Mycroft still feel he has the right to interfere and ruin and reveal secrets? Sherlock wants to bellow at the top of his voice and… shoot walls. 

But John squeezes his wrist gently and shakes his head, so Sherlock just waits as best he can, pushing down the pulse of irritation his brother’s meddling always produces.

“I’m no great fan of the way your brother treats you either, but I listened to what he had to say,” John admits, his face an open book. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen him more humble, more careful about what you’d want him to say or keep from me. When we first got home from the hospital, he told me that you had a period as a child when you stopped talking for several months – he didn’t say why, and you don’t need to tell me, but… selective mutism is usually associated with anxiety. Do you think that this might be significant? Are you… I don’t know… experiencing something that might be preventing you from speaking, other than your aphasia?”

Sherlock drops the pad to the floor and stands up. John watches him with wary eyes as Sherlock reaches out his good hand in an obvious request. John’s gaze skims from his hand to his face and back, and it takes him way too long to accept and allow Sherlock to help him rise from the sofa and tow him gently towards his bedroom. His reluctance grows palpably when he realises where they are going, and it has to mean something that John doesn’t baulk and refuse as they cross the threshold.

“Sherlock,” he says softly. “I don’t think your bedroom is such a great idea for this conversation.”

Is John trying to let him down gently? Has Sherlock’s argument not had the impact he was hoping for? He tries to stay calm as he settles himself on the bed and encourages John to do the same. If it is fear that has stolen his voice this time, then his only hope is to ignore the warnings and indications that John has already decided against Sherlock’s wishes. It can only make his difficulties worse.

Rolling onto his good shoulder, Sherlock prods and pushes John until he is on his side with Sherlock spooned up behind him as best he can with their combined infirmity.

It’s already full daylight outside, but here at the back of the house in Sherlock’s room it is still cool and dim. They have been in the sitting room long enough that the sheets have lost any trace of body heat that lingered.

Without his phone or his notepad Sherlock is gambling a lot on this move. John’s body-language shrieks of discomfort – hard shoulders, rigid posture and the flex and close of his hand. 

Closing his eyes, Sherlock thinks of the words he needs to say, lets them coalesce slowly in the front of his mind and curl carefully around his tongue. This is easier without John’s gaze on him. He settles his breath and hums against John’s hair.

It has to be now. The damage has already been done. John knows and he hasn’t left yet. What words he has, he must use now.

“I dreamed. Of you,” he whispers.

John’s body stiffens further, straining to listen to Sherlock’s words.

“Last night? The nightmares?” John asks carefully.

Sherlock shakes his head, hoping John can feel it.

“Since you’ve been home? While you were recovering?”

Sherlock shakes more emphatically each time John guesses and then waits while John joins up the mental dots.

“Do you… do you mean while you were in Critical Care?” 

Sherlock tips his head and puts his forehead against John’s skull to enhance the sensation when Sherlock nods, just once. 

“I know that you know that there is limited evidence for patients dreaming when sedated. There have been a few studies, but it’s not widely accepted.”

Sherlock nods again. He can feel despair rolling off John in waves – it’s in the hollow pitch of his voice and the bleak curve of his shoulders.

“Mind palace. There… We are… we were there,” Sherlock whispers, never having wanted command of his voice more than now. He needs to insist, argue, press his point. He needs to stalk around and gesticulate. He cannot so much as create full sentences yet.

John stays quiet, waiting for Sherlock’s next laboured words. It’s exhausting, and he swallows against the frustration.

“Tre... no. _Trapped_ ,” he husks.

“Trapped? In your mind palace?”

Sherlock nods against John’s head again.

“Has that ever happened before? Being unable to leave?”

The slightest shake of his head and John gusts out a heavy breath. 

“That must have been terrifying.”

Sherlock shakes again. “There… You were there. You is… you... but not...” He grunts in frustration. “Answ... no. Diff... different you.”

John cranes his neck to look over his shoulder at Sherlock, but Sherlock is curled tight against him and John cannot turn far enough.

“And that was a good thing?” John asks, sinking back to the pillow.

Sherlock nods, releasing the scent of John’s sweat and shampoo as his hair is disturbed.

“So is this some kind of Stockholm Syndrome thing or…?”

He shakes his head and breathes. He knows the next words, but they are not easy although Sherlock thinks they should be. “You…” He breathes and works his jaw, his tongue. He swallows to relieve the tightness of his throat. He thinks of sweet smiles and ‘just because’ kisses and John’s fingers in his hair. “You. Loved. Me.”

It’s not quite the entirety of the truth, but it’s a start. _You dared to love me there, unlike here_.

One word at a time; each a small battle won. 

John breathes in sharply through his nose and swallows. Apparently the words are as hard to hear as they are to speak. 

“I… What does that mean?” John asks hoarsely.

That’s too big a question for Sherlock’s current level of communication and he struggles to find a way to explain to John.

“We loved. Inst–– we start it in the beginning. _From_ the beginning. As we have… should have.”

John’s body is drawn tight as if the slightest movement will cause a detonation. His voice is clipped and scratchy. “And you believe that this was…”

“We should have been. That,” Sherlock breathes. His throat and his head are aching with the effort of being articulate. “When we met. I saw…”

“But you did not observe,” John finishes for him and Sherlock nods gratefully.

“Not what–– not because I didn’t want… it. But because… too much. Scared,” he admits through gritted teeth.

The scent and warmth of John beside him is perfect. It makes everything seem right in a way that is becoming increasingly familiar. Sherlock revels in it for a few moments while John is quiet. He’s clearly thinking furiously about what happens next, what to say, but Sherlock is sucking in as much of this moment as he can, letting it bleed into his pores and become a part of him. This is the moment when everything changes but the current of that is too great, too wide and too fast; Sherlock knows it must end, but while he can he rests here where the undertow is deflected by John.

Finally John sighs. The effort to unlock his muscles takes him a moment and Sherlock can feel him soften everywhere they are touching. But still it takes him several minutes to find words.

“I won’t leave,” he says. “I know I said I can’t go back, but… If this isn’t what you want, we can, I dunno, stop now, stay as we are. We _are_ friends, Sherlock, we don’t need to be more than that to make me want to stay. You weren’t wrong, I was… interested, but we became close and I… It’s not a deal breaker is what I’m saying. Yes, I fancied you, but then we were on cases, running around London and becoming friends and it was enough. It was… good. Better than good. So don’t feel that you have to do this because you think that’s what I want. Or to make me stay.”

Sherlock shakes his head. He lifts his arm and balances it on John’s, resting his healing shoulder. ‘Fancied’, John had said – past tense, but John’s actions of late may have well revealed it’s an ongoing state. “It’s what I want. Better together. Happy,” he murmurs and John tilts his head to listen.

“ _Happy_?” John asks as if he thinks such a thing isn’t even a part of Sherlock’s vocabulary.

“Happy.”

John sighs again but Sherlock is almost certain that this is capitulation rather than despair. 

“This is madness. I can’t believe I’m even considering it.”

This time it is Sherlock who dares not move. He breathes as slowly and quietly as he can and ignores the urge to roll off his left side where his ribs are complaining bitterly. But John is thinking; Sherlock can see his jaw working as he chews his bottom lip – he can feel the rhythmic twitch of muscles as he curls his hands into fists.

“Okay,” he says quietly and Sherlock’s stomach swoops unexpectedly. “Okay,” John repeats and it’s stronger, more confident this time. “This is what we are going to do. You have an appointment on Thursday for your follow-up MRI results and a chat with the neurologist. We will wait until you have those results before we go any further with this. If you still feel the same way after that, and they are all clear then… then we will… we’ll talk about it then. Okay?”

“I will. Feel. Same way,” Sherlock says, his husked words falling over each other in his hurry to assure John.

“If you don’t, that’s fine, Sherlock. I know you think that…”

He pinches John’s side and huffs into his hair, letting his sudden possessive streak take over. It makes John flinch quite pleasingly.

“Fine,” John mutters, “but for the last time, you have a get out of jail free card, okay? No hard feelings. No questions asked. This is too important. Forget what I said about not being able to go back. It wouldn’t be…” He clears his throat. “We’ll work it out, okay? If we need to, then we can.”

Sherlock hums to let him know that he has heard and understood, even if he’s irritated that John is hanging on to excuses when none are required. He then unapologetically nuzzles his nose into John’s hair and closes his eyes. They might not go back to sleep, but Thursday is still days away and Sherlock wants to explore what affection he can before John decides that embraces and bed-sharing are not in the spirit of ‘waiting’ for some spurious date he’s picked at random.


	12. A Candle for the Table

There are visitors that afternoon. Mycroft’s assistant arrives with another new phone in a sleek, expensive-looking box and retreats again without comment. Then Lestrade calls by with the cold cases he promised to bring. Sherlock finds that he is surprisingly indifferent to the lure of the files and at first, he worries the injury may have affected his motivation for the Work in some sinister manner. But, half an hour of analysis lying on the sofa with his fingers steepled under his chin establishes that his attention is simply and wholly distracted by John’s ridiculous embargo on their proto-relationship.

It’s not as if Sherlock is about to corner him and ravish him – neither of them are what one might call fighting fit. John is still hobbling about and having to remind himself to walk as normally as he can on his injured knee, Sherlock is still wearing his sling during the day and taking stronger painkillers at night when he takes it off, and both of them still wince when a sudden cough or an ill-advised turn makes their ribs twinge. But John is being evasive on an emotional level as well as a physical one and getting irritatingly good at predicting Sherlock’s schemes to gain some additional contact with him. It’s likely he needs time to process this paradigm shift in their relationship, and Sherlock wants to grant it. 

Then again, he’s never been a patient man capable of postponing his indulgences. Things have not quite devolved into Sherlock chasing John around the kitchen table, but by that evening he has sulkily set himself up at his desk with the notes and photos from one of the case files strewn around as he searches the internet on John’s computer.

“You know your computer is on the coffee table? You could always use your own.”

“Why bother? Yours is fine, thanks,” Sherlock replies and doesn’t immediately register what has happened until John’s silence goes on for several seconds longer than expected. He turns his head to find John staring at him, eyes wide and lips parted in surprise. A smile breaks across his face and Sherlock quickly reviews their last exchange.

He spoke. Just like that.

John told him off and Sherlock replied without thinking. 

Maybe it is as John has been hinting – that he’s just out of practice, that he needs to use his words to regain his abilities, that just waiting won’t bring them back. The syntax appears to have returned, and perhaps it’s been there for days now. It appears his suspicion had been right – it’s the fear that needed to be addressed in order to regain his voice.

Sherlock sits back in his chair and lets a smile of his own quirk his mouth up.

John stands and crosses the room to stop before Sherlock. His eyes are bright and happy, his breathing is elevated and he wets his bottom lip with his tongue.

_John wants to kiss him._

The deduction, although so obvious Anderson could probably have made it, still makes Sherlock’s blood sing in his veins. He feels a prickle of excitement skitter down his spine. John wants to kiss him but thinks he shouldn’t, which is ridiculous and tiresome, but when Sherlock opens his mouth to say so, his diabolically unreliable voice fails him, the words catching in his throat like tiny barbs, refusing to rise and be articulated. 

John must see his frustration, his smile softens from triumphant to tender and he reaches out a hand to Sherlock’s shoulder. He places it, warm and reassuring, lingering after a tiny squeeze.

“It’s a good start, Sherlock,” he says and rubs his thumb onto the skin of Sherlock’s neck, following the line of his tendon up to the lobe of his ear before he steps back. “Don’t get stressed about it, yeah?”

Sherlock assumes he’s off the hook for a while, in terms of speaking.

He’s wrong. “How have you been getting on with these? Any progress?” John asks brightly, turning towards the scattered file. 

Sherlock knows a distraction technique when he sees one, but allows himself to be redirected, highlighting to John the inconsistencies in the witness accounts and the evidence by way of pointing and creating some hastily scribbled notes. A couple of hours go by in this way and when John finally says goodnight he presses Sherlock’s new phone into his hand, SIM already installed, and retreats up to his room without shutting the door.

**You owe me Tiramisu. SH**

The chime from upstairs is reassuring as is John’s melodic chuckle. Sherlock is once again profoundly grateful that his hearing has recovered sufficiently to enjoy such things. John’s voice would have been the hardest thing to lose, had the damage been permanent.

**True. I will sort that out in the morning. Goodnight Sherlock** , John replies.

**Goodnight, John.**

>>>>><<<<<

When Sherlock wakes the following morning, he is irritated to find that he has slept late once again. Is this going to be the new normal and for how long? He used to get by with very little sleep; it’s such a waste of valuable time. 

He pulls on his dressing gown and walks out to find John already at the desk, tapping away at his laptop. His bitten lips, distracted air and empty cup seem to add up to a blog entry that is troubling him somewhat. He’s most likely trying to summarise the madness that was the last week before their injuries. Not that John ever asks for his input, but Sherlock isn’t going to be a lot of assistance should John break the habit and ask this time. Most likely John’s fumbling digest of it all will just make the patchwork collage of Sherlock’s recollections, even more jumbled. At this point, although Sherlock knows that his memory is unreliable and not entirely his own, it has come to be a part of his history in a process not unlike a graft. The edges of it are rough and obvious, but Sherlock has little hope that his own recall of the detail of those days will return enough to replace this organic memory patch. His memory was exceptional and so was his command of it, and he’d like to think he could still will those memories to return, but his recovery has been an exercise in mortality and his hope is thinning. 

John gives him a quick, distracted smile as Sherlock wanders into the kitchen to fill the kettle. He takes down two mugs, quickly brewing some English Breakfast and fixing them to their specific tastes. Trying not to be self-conscious about it, he carries them both into the sitting room and deposits John’s beside him, carefully edging his empty mug out of the way.

John, thankfully, doesn’t make a fuss. He clears his throat and offers up a quiet murmur of thanks.

Sherlock sits opposite and reviews his notes from the day before. They are both doing their utmost to pretend that nothing momentous is happening, that they are not somehow waiting for the other shoe to drop. In some ways Sherlock feels quite ridiculous not to be acknowledging all that happened yesterday but, that said, has no idea how they could mark it under John’s draconian criteria without inane smiling and soft gazes, and frankly he doesn’t think either of them will wear that well for long. 

The bottom of Sherlock’s stomach is buzzing with excitement and it feels a lot like anxiety but doesn’t come with a looming sense of dread. He could get used to this. It feels like that first night when they chased a serial killer. It feels like the weeks after, when he lay in his bed listening to John just existing in the flat and being so amazed by the way the man had just limped in and banished his loneliness with so little visible effort.

By the time Sherlock has drunk the last of his tea, John has clearly triumphed in his quest for the  _ mote juste _ and is tapping away like a demented chicken with his woeful typing skills.

Sherlock’s phone pings in his dressing gown pocket and he fishes it out, sighing when he sees his brother’s name.

“Don’t forget to thank him for the phone,” John says, deadpan, without looking up from his keyboard.

Sherlock smirks and is quietly pleased by John’s deductive process which, although rudimentary, seems to improve when Sherlock is the subject. Perhaps they are similar in that personal interest is required for something to be worthy of attention and brain power.

Ugh. Mycroft. Tedious.

_**You know, Dr Watson raises some very valid points in your discussions thus far. Can I assume that you have considered his reservations and that you can allay them satisfactorily? In short, are you sure this is wise, brother mine? MH** _

**Your opinion on matters of which you have an utter lack of knowledge is worthless. Kindly direct your massive interfering nose elsewhere. SH**

John clears his throat pointedly.

**John says I have to thank you for the phone** ; **he believes that’s what I’m typing. He’s wrong. SH**

_**You are quite welcome. I hear they do last for longer than a week in most cases, though I’m sure you are itching to test that theory. MH** _

**Kindly piss off. SH**

_**Do be certain before you venture further with this touching endeavour, Sherlock. John is important to you and it would be folly to assume that his patience is infinite, even with you. MH** _

Sherlock rolls his eyes and puts his phone back into his pocket. He picks up the SOCO’s report and scowls at it in lieu of his brother’s stupid face.

After ten minutes, John gets up to refresh their mugs again and walks stiffly into the kitchen. The usual sounds reach Sherlock where the scowl is beginning to give him a headache; kettle, refrigerator, spoon, bread bin, toaster. 

Mycroft needs to mind his own bloody business. Sherlock is certain about his feelings for John and what is more, he is under no obligation to explain himself to anyone but the object of his affections. With hindsight, he can see how much he has repressed, how much he refused to see even while his own behaviour towards his flatmate, although perhaps not overtly demonstrative, was at odds with any other acquaintance he had. The fact that he modified his own behaviour around John, the fact that they had cohabited for six months without John moving out – these things should have flagged in what great esteem he held his only friend – to himself and also to Mycroft. 

Even if his recent injuries have enabled the neuroplasticity of his brain to forge new pathways, allowing him to pursue the idea of a romantic attachment with John, the only practical difference is that he is now acting on these feelings, rather than saving them up to create a pseudo-John in his mind palace as a coping mechanism.

Stupid Mycroft. 

Sherlock’s phone chimes and he decides that if it is another text from his brother, he will microwave the damn thing. 

Instead, there’s an Event Update.

_ Shared Calendar Update – New Event. Dinner at Angelo’s. Thursday 24.06.2010. 7pm. From John Watson _ _. Accept _ _ / _ _ Decline _ _. _

It has gone very quiet in the kitchen. No toast scraping. No clatter of cutlery. 

Sherlock opens his phone, accepts the calendar suggestion and hears a corresponding chime from the kitchen a second later.

John doesn’t look at him directly as he returns to place a plate of toast and a mug beside Sherlock, but his eyes are bright and content.

>>>>><<<<<

Summer has taken its time to arrive, but the dismal start seems to have finally loosened its grip on London since they have been out of action, and from the cab Sherlock sees people making the most of the lighter evenings; pub patrons spill out onto the streets in bright colours like displaced exotic birds, people stroll in the last of the day’s heat and it feels like the city is taking a cleansing breath before tomorrow’s rush hour begins again. He checks his pocket one more time as the cab nears Northumberland Street. The rectangular folded paper is reassuringly present but feels insufficient for the task Sherlock is relying on it to perform. He watches as the restaurant comes into view and is relieved to see the figure of John Watson standing outside, scanning the street.

The flat has been subdued for most of the last week, a charged quiet that has left them both unsettled and frustrated. John has been insisting that Sherlock use his words, arguing that the more he does so, the easier it will become. While he seems to be completely correct in that, Sherlock is weary from the effort it takes to prepare and rehearse most sentences in his head before he speaks them. There have been further instances of him speaking spontaneously, usually in response to something John has said while he’s been half-engaged elsewhere. It appears anxiety rather than a malfunctioning motor cortex causes the most word mangling these days. There is marked progress, undoubtedly, but Sherlock still hardly feels up to the challenge of having to argue his corner should the need arise.

As the cab pulls up, John grins in greeting. He must have popped back home to change before he came out and has dressed carefully – not too smart and not too casual. He seems to have avoided any of the things he would normally have worn on a date and Sherlock tries not to let that distract him. Already he feels like a chapter is about to end – here – almost where it began. Even if he had full control of his speech he would be worried about where a conversation might take them tonight. As it is, he is relying on John’s sense of social respectability in a public place to steer them through what could be an interesting hour or two. 

He has already spent more time than is healthy worrying over how this evening will unfold. After his dismal first attempt to show John his heart, he doubts that the man will stick around long enough to listen to explanations if he ruins this a second time. Of course, this anxiety will add its weight to the already hefty load of overcoming his aphasia sufficiently to say the things that John is going to want to hear, most likely rendering Sherlock incoherent. There’s very little chance that he will be able to conceal that apprehension, and that in turn will add fuel to John’s concern that Sherlock’s speech problems come from a more extensive injury than has so far been detected. From there, it is only a small leap for John’s argument about his emotional state to rear its hideous head again, giving him a plausible reason to refute Sherlock’s declarations of affection.

But it is too late for a change of plan now; John is waiting for him with an increasingly strained smile and Sherlock tries to persuade his stomach to settle and his thoughts to calm.

He pays the cabbie, and John opens the door to the restaurant for him. Angelo is there to greet them before they have even removed their jackets. He has a candle placed already on the table he shows them to and he lights it without asking them. Sherlock wonders what John had told the man when he’d made the reservation.

“Sherlock, Dr Watson, it’s good to see you. I’ll bring you a bottle of something good, put the colour back into your cheeks, yeah?”

He’s gone again before anyone can reply and John raises his eyebrows in bemusement, likely to diffuse the tension.

“You okay?” John asks simply.

Is he? Realising how distracted he’s been, how scattered his thoughts in the cab, Sherlock takes inventory of himself. He hadn’t even greeted Angelo.

He’s fidgeting too, he realises; his left hand thumb repeatedly tracing the edge of his phone in his pocket.

“It’s just me,” John says with an apologetic smile. “Maybe we should have w––”

Sherlock determinedly shakes his head. Waiting hasn’t helped their brittle, fledgeling relationship; the last few days of eggshell-walking is the proof of that. He will be alright, as long as he doesn’t mess things up this time. Maybe they should have picked a different restaurant. Maybe they should have stayed at home. How does any of this even work? Sherlock’s grasp of human courting habits is flimsy, at best; with John it’s terra incognita – the chances for failure are manyfold and by no means predictable. Perhaps this is one of the reasons that Sherlock chose to ignore sentimental entanglement; the risks of showing your hand are staggeringly high and the stakes are all or nothing.

“Yes,” he manages around the lump in his throat. Single word answers are an indicator of distress that John has picked up on before so he forces out another. “You?” 

John nods but the silence begins to lengthen, causing Sherlock to wonder once again how the hell people do this. He has (had?) thousands of facts at his beck and call, but not a single one of them is suitable for a dinner date. He can’t address what happened at the pool for fear of reminding John of his perceived infirmity. Ditto Moriarty or the cases that led up to his death. And why isn’t John taking charge of this part of the proceedings? He’s been on any number of dates with, admittedly, varying levels of success. Why isn’t he picking up the conversational slack? Should Sherlock be doing something different to mark this occasion as significant? Is there a tradition or formula that he has inadvertently omitted? He knows he shouldn't be spiralling in internal argument with himself now – he should be paying attention to John.

This turns out to be a good plan with John looking handsome in a dark blue, tailored fit shirt, watching him with a gentle half-smile on his lips – Sherlock wants to connect with the man so badly it has literally driven him to distraction. 

“I hope you weren’t imagining that you were only having tiramisu?” John finally says over the low chatter and clink of china and glassware.

Sherlock shrugs and pulls his phone out of his pocket, but thinks better of using it. He places it on the table, well out of fidgeting distance. With a glance at the other diners, he clears his throat.

“Should be once... loud… allowed to choose dessert for dinner when... is poorly,” he says and relishes the warmth in John’s eyes when their gazes catch and hold. 

John chuckles and Sherlock could not look away right now if he tried. John laughs so easily in his company, and it lights up his face, makes a home there in a way that Sherlock cannot help but react to when he sees it. He’s never had such an intense sympathetic reaction to anyone else’s expressions as far as he can remember.

It’s an effort to make himself speak, he cannot deny. While he will try to reply to John and feels comfortable enough to make the innumerable errors that litter his sentences around him, he is still reluctant to talk with others present. Even with Mrs Hudson he still confines his conversation to one- or two-word utterances punctuated by eye-rolling. He did string together a very useful chain of insults for Mycroft earlier in the week, although his brother didn’t seem very appreciative of the effort it had taken him.

Angelo arrives back at their table with bread, olives and a bottle of a very nice Montepulciano D’Abruzzo Riserva which he opens and leaves on the table. Clearly they are to be spoiled more than usual tonight.

“The risotto with white truffle is good today - I’ll bring you some,” he says. For a big man, Angelo moves remarkably quickly which one might think would have served him better in his previous profession, but John looks happy enough being told what he’s having so Sherlock relaxes accordingly.

“You know, I owe you an apology,” John says, rearranging the bread basket on the table. “The first time we came here…”

A glass crashes to the floor behind the bar and there’s a small, ironic cheer from the other diners. Sherlock barely notices, waiting for the rest of John’s sentence. The first time they came here, Sherlock had been cocky and unapproachable and he had ruined any chance that John might have opened up to him or followed through with his subtle seduction. John had reacted with predictable self-defensive measures, insisting that he hadn’t been propositioning him; his knee-jerk reaction then obviously being to retreat and deny at the slightest opposition. That conversation had set the tone for many of their subsequent interactions and created awkwardness between them that Sherlock had not had the skill to defuse.

Is that what John is trying to apologise for? Can Sherlock let him do that when it was his own ineptitude and fear that had pushed John away even before they had known each other for three days?

“The first time we came here, I told you that people don’t have arch enemies,” John says, spearing an olive with a cocktail stick. He twirls it a few times and smiles. “You really did have one, even if you didn’t know it by then.”

He must mean Moriarty, but Sherlock rather thinks that he had done a pretty good job himself when it came to derailing his relationship with John.

He notes John’s body language – he appears relaxed as though this is a light conversation. A gentle tease or even flirtation? It must mean that he doesn’t want to actually discuss Moriarty – does he instead want to talk about Sherlock and remind him of their introduction? That would be a good sign. Isn’t this why John has brought them here – to rewrite the memory of that first not-date and give them, perhaps, a second chance? 

“I had two nem… enemies. I am glad... I am back to one only,” he says, noticing again how John’s eyes follow his lips when he speaks. It sends something like static skittering through his bones, leaving warmth to flood in behind. “Don’t tell... Mycroft I said that. His ego is bloat… bloated enough.”

John nods and pops the olive in his mouth, chewing thoughtfully. Sherlock lifts the wine and holds the bottle, neck tilted, over John’s glass waiting for agreement, then pours a judicious measure into his glass, getting a look of mild surprise from John when he does the same to his own. 

“Are we drowning our sorrows, then?” John asks. “Celebrating the end of our painkillers or replacing them?” 

Sherlock shakes his head. “What we should have done,” he manages, and feels quite pathetic over the swell of pride over not having fumbled his words. “Sen–– celebrating us.” He’s glad that he thought to have a line prepared.

Sherlock lifts his glass and tips it toward his friend. Although they are not in the window seat this time, he can see the smoggy city sky darkening through lavender and yellow outside, lifting the glimmer of the candles and the way they reflect from so many silvered surfaces.

John looks especially fine tonight. His hair has been cut today and he has a little more product in it than usual, bringing out the contrast between the shades of dark blonde. The bruising around his eyes is barely visible and his shirt fits him better than all of his others. It accentuates his shoulders and the colour of his irises. Why did Sherlock never stop to notice such things before – no, not notice, he notices everything. Why did he never stop to appreciate them?

John’s regard of him is very direct this evening too. Has he always looked at Sherlock this way? Can it be that he was truly so wrapped up in his work and in his own mind that he didn’t understand the frankness and bravery of such a bold, admiring stare? Did it honestly never occur to him that he could have had this too? John  _ and _ the Work, instead of embroiling him in crime scenes and chases and corpses until he became part of the Work himself?

“What would you... say we are drinking to?” Sherlock asks, slowing down his speech to make sure the words come out right.

“Better days,” John murmurs. . 

John stills for a moment, holding Sherlock’s gaze before he taps their glasses together and takes a swallow of the wine. 

No one else is listening to them; both the nearest tables are empty but there is a large, noisy gathering further back in the restaurant and other diners are in pairs, talking together. Sherlock has always made a point of being aware of his surroundings, it is a necessity in his line of work but he feels mildly ridiculous that he has assessed the room already for the reason of self-consciousness. Tonight he’s very aware of the healing skin on his scalp and the shaved area which still occasionally itches abominably. He has done his best to make his curls mask the injury, but it’s not going to fool anyone. Add that to John’s healing bruises and the way they are holding themselves and only an idiot could miss that they have had a rough fortnight. He doesn’t want to draw more attention to them by spouting nonsensical rubbish and embarrass John.

“You’re enjoying taking me by surprise with your progress,” John accuses, putting down his glass and letting his fingers trace over the curve of the stem.

Sherlock shrugs and nods. “Easier. With you.” 

“Easier to talk when there’s only one person listening?”

Sherlock looks for a way to condense what he wants to say and comes up with, “When  _ you _ listen and fill in–– gaps be… because me… you know me.”

John’s regard, if anything, sharpens and their gazes lock and hold again, as if waiting for some secret signal, some indefinable sign that something should happen. This isn’t the first time it has occurred by any means, but perhaps this is the first time Sherlock begins to understand it for what it is.

John sits back in his chair finally and nods. “Do you remember much about that episode you had as a child with the… um…?”

John doesn’t have to say it out loud – he must mean the mutism.

“Not really. I was quite young. Don’t know www… why it happened. Or why it stopped.”

“Stress has a lot to do with it. Could have been anything – starting school or a bereavement or moving house. How old were you when Mycroft started boarding?”

Sherlock makes the most horrified face he can manage. “That… that idiot?” he huffs, outraged. “It… he’s not why.”

John tips his head and shrugs. “If you’re sensitive to change then it might be that something made you anxious. You have quite a singular mind – why would we think that your reaction to situations might not be correspondingly singular? I assume you have always been exceptional and losing the attention of another exceptional mind like Mycroft’s could have left you feeling isolated, especially if your parents were busy.”

“Can barely remember it. Busy...body probably exa...ggerated.”

John licks his lips and takes another sip of wine.

“Your mum and dad are great. It was good to meet them. They seem very down to earth and lovely,” he says, making a good job of steering the conversation once again into clearer waters. 

Sherlock smiles wryly. “You mean not like Ma… Mmm… Mycroft and me.”

John’s eyes gleam with amusement and he leans an elbow on the table, easing himself closer. “I didn’t mean it like that! They just weren’t what I was expecting somehow. I like them a lot, they’re sweet and funny and very… normal.”

Sherlock rolls his eyes. “I do ver... hate to… repeat myself, John.”

John laughs aloud. “Well, you two are pretty unusual. I thought that  _ you _ might have sprung to life fully-formed with your coat and your cheekbones and all.”

“I’m not Anth… Athena, John!”

“Oh, I dunno. What were her specialities? Wisdom, strategy, justice, courage and inspiration; sounds a lot like you, I’d say.”

John knows the most obscure things, astronomy being a recent example, which never ceases to confound Sherlock, but in this case the parallel with a mythical Greek goddess is clearly intended as a compliment. 

“Thank you, but I… do not have... the required… gentle... genitalia. Or armour. I do like owls, though.” 

“And when you’ve got all that going for you, only an idiot would quibble about genitalia,” John says quietly. His thumb is still trailing the curve of the glass stem and he’s following its path with his eyes. He takes a sudden breath, lifts his eyes and grins. “And I bet you look great in a toga.”

Sherlock toys with the idea of correcting his terminology but he looks so pleased with his joke that Sherlock can’t deny him his moment, which Angelo disrupts seconds later with plates of risotto and salad. The truffle – real truffle, not just some artificially flavoured oil – does smell delicious and Sherlock wonders if he will ever get his sleep and hunger reflexes back under control or if these are another example of his newly modified reality. He supposes that it’s a small price to pay for his continued existence, particularly if they come with an understanding with John. Relationship. Partnership. Whatever he wants to call it; he puts more stock in nomenclature than Sherlock does.

John makes happy noises about the food and they both make a pretty decent dent on their plates of risotto. When Angelo returns to check on them Sherlock manages to order Tiramisu while John hides his pleased smile in his napkin.

“I think it was the thought of it that woke him at the hospital,” John jokes when Angelo preens about Sherlock’s love of his dessert.

With an espresso in front of John and a perfect cuboid of rich, sweet dessert before Sherlock, they catch each other's eyes and smile a little awkwardly.

“Finally,” Sherlock says and John bows his head in mock reverence. 

John is fidgeting with his fingers and tries to look nonchalant as he glances out onto the street, so Sherlock is prepared when he speaks.

“So your physio was happy for you to leave the sling off around the house? I have to say that you’ve been very good about wearing it – I thought we’d have much more sulking about it.”

Sherlock sends him a withering look.

“And how did it go with the neurologist?” John asks, looking down to stir his coffee unnecessarily.

And here it is – the thing that has been hanging over them for days. Sherlock needs a moment to breathe. He takes a bite of his Tiramisu and wonders how John wants him to play this. Is it a genuine enquiry about his medical care so far or, going on his sudden lack of eye contact and the finger gymnastics, is he asking about Sherlock’s declaration of attachment?

He puts down his spoon for a moment, reaches into his jacket pocket and passes John the thick fold of patient record printouts that Sherlock insisted on waiting for before leaving the consulting rooms of his neurologist. His MRI had been normal, and the neuropsychological assessment John had goaded him into agreeing to had shown little to no residual effect from the brain bleed except for the remaining difficulties with stringing together longer sentences.

John holds the papers for a moment, then puts them down on the table, laying a deliberate hand on top. He sniffs and sits back, giving Sherlock his undivided attention. With both hands on the table, John looks like he is braced for something.

“You tell me, if you would.” 

“John. I cannot tell... hope… what you hoped to hear. Every… thing is fine. Apart from my speech. There’s a copy in… of… the MRI in there. To all intense… intents and… purposes, I am… the same me as be… before. Just…” He growls in frustration; every word is a skirmish with his brain, every sentence is a battlefield. Putting together an argument seems insurmountable and desperation dogs his steps, waiting for him to fail. If only he could talk properly!

John holds Sherlock’s eye, as if waiting for him to elaborate, but Sherlock merely lifts an eyebrow, gritting his teeth.

John reaches out to touch the back of his hand, but Sherlock retreats. John will get frustrated with him. He must be so already. And even if by some miracle, John has the patience to listen, the words are not going to come. It’s not that simple.


	13. The Real Thing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're reading a love story and trying to avoid bodily fluids, then skip the end of this chapter from where Sherlock turns the sitting room lights out. If bodily fluids are your thing, then have at it!

Sherlock grabs the papers and pushes them to John’s side of the table, crumpling up the tablecloth a bit.

John sighs and unfolds the report with every sign of reluctance. He sniffs again, swallows and begins to read. His always very expressive mouth is pursed, but smoothes as he becomes engrossed in the results.

Sherlock feels slightly sick with nervous anticipation, but the Tiramisu was the culinary point of this evening’s trip and he doesn’t want to give John any reason to doubt his health. He takes a few more bites, then signals for the bill which brings Angelo over who makes much of being offended by the very thought. He has wrapped up a couple of extra slices of dessert for Sherlock who takes them with a nod of thanks. 

John finally looks up from the papers and hastily rises from his chair and adds his thank yous to Sherlock’s. He drops a generous tip on the table, then passes Sherlock his jacket and grabs his own. Lip licking and no eye contact, John gives away his agitation as they make their way onto the street.

They hail a cab to take them home. Normally they would walk on a night like this – clear and warm, but neither he nor John are fully recovered and Sherlock suspects that they both require some solitude to process all that was revealed during the course of their meal which a stroll through London’s streets would not provide.

The taxi ride is silent. Between them sits the box of dessert on top of the report that has so occupied John’s thoughts that evening. The longer the silence goes on, the more certain Sherlock is that he has not only confirmed his health, but has irreparably damaged his relationship with John. He tells himself that it’s better to know. He tells himself that he has lived without romantic love all his life and that he will be able to do so again. He tells himself that John has assured him he won’t leave. None of these arguments seem to have much effect on his aching heart. John too seems unsettled and agitated, Sherlock thinks, watching him fidget and catch himself again and again.

It’s not late as they climb the stairs of 221B and John wastes no time in heading straight to his room. Still unable to play his violin, Sherlock decides to read a book for a while to try to take his mind off the disaster that was that day, before he attempts to sleep. He places the box of dessert in the fridge and goes to his room to change. He cannot bear the thought of bed – goodness knows that he’s spent more than enough time there recently, so he carefully dresses himself in pyjamas and dressing gown, and goes back into the sitting room. 

His shoulder is singing merry hell tonight and he wishes he had more painkillers or had thought to bring home the rest of that bottle of wine from Angelo’s. He sits back in his chair and tries not to think about the restaurant or John, up in his room, avoiding him. Sherlock wishes he’d stayed to talk it out – this agony of the soul, for want of much better words, is dreadful to endure and reminds him that life before his head injury had some significant advantages. A man detached from his emotions would not feel this constant rise and fall of the tide of sentiment, dragging hope and despair in turn, leaving him an empty thing, filled only with the ghosts of dreams, good and bad.

Sherlock is too scattered to read, so he picks up one of Lestrade’s files and flicks through it aimlessly, surprised when John appears in the doorway, out of his earlier outfit and now in a t-shirt, jeans and bare feet. He seems uncertain about his choice to return now he is here, glancing over his shoulder pensively. His lip takes the brunt of his indecision, but eventually he comes to sit opposite.

“I don’t know where to start,” John says nervously. Sherlock is too distracted to understand the low-energy demeanour and leaps to what he thinks is the obvious conclusion. His stomach heaves and everything is suddenly too much. John is here to let him down gently, to tell him ‘no’, despite everything they have been through. To make a mockery of their friendship and put an end to any thoughts of more.

“Then let me help,” Sherlock offers, his voice harsh and his words suffering from his desperation. “The f...fffffact that you need a piece of p… paper to even enter...tain the idea that it is poss… possible for me to... fall in love with you…”

John’s face is stricken for a moment before his brows draw down. “It’s not that. It was  _ never _ that.”

“Then, what?” Sherlock challenges. 

Their voices are rising with their frustration levels and this is just about to go horribly wrong. John appears to realise this; he closes his eyes and takes a few seconds to relax his shoulders before he opens them again. He stares over Sherlock’s shoulder for some time before trying once more.

“Can you tell me about it? Being trapped in your mind palace? Just… use your mobile if you have to, but tell me. You made it sound important and... I’m trying to understand, so I need to know.”

Sherlock breathes, feeling the tide turn once more, feeling the flood of explanation that rises up in an effort to convince John – because perhaps that’s what this is. Perhaps this is John wanting to believe, trying to find any reason that he can build upon to let himself be persuaded of Sherlock’s regard.

He nods at John, encouraging him to ask the questions to which he needs answers, and John follows.

“Were you aware it wasn’t real?”

Sherlock nods again. “Like lucid fee... dreams. Stuck one room. Stuck… in… one room.”

“You said you were trapped, you didn’t say it was in one room. Do you think that was significant?” John is working hard to grasp the meaning. Sherlock cannot gain by keeping anything from him now that his secret is out in the open. 

Sherlock nods and shrugs at the same time.

“How? Which room?”

Sherlock lifts a hand and circles his index finger to indicate their sitting room and kitchen. He runs his eye over the evidence of their life here together. It’s more of a home than he has known in many years. Although recently cleaned up and repaired, they belonged here from the moment John climbed the stairs for the first time.

John stills, eyebrows lifted, and his lips, suddenly, twitch to the right in amusement. “Wait. You have our sitting room in your mind palace?”

Sherlock nods and returns the slight smile. “Surprised? It’s not a real palace. Only a... mmmetaphor.”

And now they are both sniggering, one of their magically inappropriate moments of hilarity that usually strike them when tensions run high. Sherlock aches with how much he loves John’s high-pitched giggles.

“Right, right,” John agrees, sobering a little, and mutters something about being pretentious that Sherlock knows he was supposed to overhear from the wry smile that goes with it. “So, what data do you keep in your mind palace sitting room?”

“Ah,” he begins, but runs out of words. Sherlock looks at John and wonders how to answer that innocent question. Little does he know it, but he’s just hit a very large and very relevant nail on the head. 

“Something interesting I hope,” John adds with a nervous chuckle when no reply comes. “Wouldn’t want you to get bored and start shooting the walls up in there.” John’s smile is beginning to fray around the edges, and the longer Sherlock stays silent, the more awkward the moment becomes. 

“You,” he mutters. “It’s you. Your room. But...ins… it wasn’t like that. I… time wasn’t stable, I kept… jam… jumping…”

“Sherlock,” John scoots carefully forward in his chair, lifting a hand toward him. He’s watching him, concern in every gesture and flicker of expression but Sherlock knows that he wants to hear, he wants to know. Whether this is in his capacity as a medical man or because he has an inkling that this answer holds more import than he’d realised, Sherlock isn’t sure. His stutters trail off and John shifts even closer, his hand hovering over his knee. Sherlock takes a deep, settling breath and opens his mouth to speak. He feels burdened with the weight of how these next few words might affect the outcome of today, of the year, of the rest of his life. John’s intense gaze compels him to speak.

“ I didn’t… I could hear… sometimes, could hear… you.”

“Talking to you?”

Sherlock nods. “Shouting. Other people. Out...side.” He taps his head in explanation. “You, reading. My way back. Thank you.”

John nods in return but doesn’t move away.

“Inside it… was home but… you were different. Affection. Ate. Affectionate. It felt right… and natural. It was if… as if everything hap… had happened… exactly the same. Same meeting, same cases, same life but… we were… together. Something ch… changed. Maybe fight... the first night, different. Didn’t chase you off, per...haps. 

It was Christmas and… next second it was s… summer. You would go out and… I… could not follow you. I try… tie… tried, but there was something be...hind a door, terrible. I suppose... was my mind’s month... rep… res...entation of the accident or my... injuries.” Sherlock knows he is reaching the limits of his ability to explain, but John is listening so carefully, he can’t give up now. The words that make him stumble make it hard for him to pick up the thread of his sentence when he has to correct them, he can only imagine how hard it is for John to parse his efforts.

“So you’d locked yourself in one room to save yourself from the pain or the trauma? To save your identity? Retreat to your innermost self?” John is no psychologist but he has come to a similar conclusion as Sherlock did; the descent into his mind palace could well have been an instinctive act of self-preservation.

“Perhaps. But the room I ham... chose? Was where I keep my... memories of you.”

For a long beat, Sherlock dare not look at John. This has to be the most unguarded conversation of his entire adult life and he has never felt as unmade and as vulnerable as he does now. Not for the first time Sherlock wonders how people do this, bare themselves, flay themselves raw like this and keep their sanity. 

Eventually the silence becomes worse than the suspense and he glances up to see the reaction to his words.

John looks poleaxed as their eyes meet, breath held, he begins to blink and his eyes become suspiciously bright.

Sherlock supposes that he may as well speak his mind as well as he can – he can hardly make the situation any worse than it is now.

“Even if I had no... idea that I was in love with you, my mm... mind knew and took me to you... to save me.” 

Yes, perhaps it’s fanciful or dramatic, but right now, at this exact moment in time, this is exactly how Sherlock feels. He may be horribly embarrassed when reminded of it in the years to come, but if it means that John is still here, then he will embrace it, own it and be proud.

John swallows hard and seems to be searching Sherlock's face for some kind of deception, as if expecting to find it there. His heart pinches in his chest that John cannot hear such words from him without looking for a punchline or a knock-back. 

“This is a lot to take in,” John says, his voice hoarse.

“I know. I felt the same hor... waking up,” Sherlock agrees, the master of understatement.

They share a tentative smile – there-and-gone in a blink. John looks away up to the corner of the room, shaking his head a little. He takes a deep breath and sits back in his chair. Clears his throat. Licks his lip. Nervous tell. Not angry, though. Unsure. 

“What, uh… what do you think we should do?”

“Wh… what do you want to do?” Sherlock asks, careful and as gentle as he knows how.

“I want to… I don’t know… sleep on it, maybe? It’s a lot to…”

“I know,” Sherlock insists quietly and they share another hint of a smile.

John makes no move to go, making Sherlock feel even more stripped bare and bloody – as though someone would need only to lift his shirt to see his bruised heart caged by his ribs, beating his secrets to an uncaring world. 

Perhaps sleep could repair some of his barriers, let him show John a more resilient face tomorrow. “Good night, John,” Sherlock says quietly.

John nods and rises quickly, hesitantly. “Right. Yes. Good night.”

It’s all of half past nine, but Sherlock isn’t able to settle to anything. He watches John as he does his usual evening routine, checking door locks, and the kitchen appliances before taking himself off to the bathroom. Sherlock fetches a glass of water and switches off the lights, other than the one on the upper landing which will see John to bed, and turns towards his own room.

The bathroom light clicks off, the door opens and John steps out into the corridor. He has a smudge of toothpaste on his lip and his hairline is damp from washing his face. They step to either side, to allow them to pass each other, Sherlock to his bed and John to the stairs, but he stops Sherlock with a couple of fingers touched lightly to his chest.

He looks at John in mild confusion. Surely he cannot have made a decision in the time he has been in the bathroom. Searching his face for clues, Sherlock sees conflict and resolve – a strange combination that he cannot predict an action for.

“Sorry… sorry,” John mutters and steps into Sherlock’s space, crowding him into the wall. “I just wanted to…”

His shaking palm reaches out to fit the curve of Sherlock’s cheek, dry and slightly rough. His other hand slides around Sherlock's neck, stroking into the curls there and pulling his head down until their mouths are only millimeters apart. Their surprised breaths mingle and the space is so negligible that Sherlock can feel the warmth of John’s lips even before they touch.

“Sorry,” John whispers and closes the distance. Their lips meet sweetly but not tentatively. John is clearly committed to kissing Sherlock who is more than happy to go along with such an excellent impulse.

John’s hands trace across the skin of his face, jaw and throat before carding into the hair at his nape and holding on. The charge that lights through Sherlock is instant and profound – he makes an odd, involuntary grunting whine that has never crossed his lips before; he’d be embarrassed by it, but John swallows it down with every appearance of hunger and replies with a growl of his own. 

Sherlock parts his lips to breathe or curse or something, but John is there, pulling the swell of his top lip into his mouth, stroking it with his tongue, sucking it softly. He licks at Sherlock’s bottom lip next and sweeps his tongue along the line of it before going deeper.

Sherlock curls his good arm around John’s waist and pulls him, unresisting, until they are almost flush. John’s jeans are harsh against the soft cotton of his pyjama bottoms; the popped top button presses into his abdomen and the zip catches the fabric, but the heat of John’s groin tucked beside his is worth this discomfort and more. 

He works his hand beneath John’s t-shirt and palms the muscles of his back, relishing the twist and stretch as John tightens his grip in Sherlock’s hair to angle his mouth.

“I’ve been trying to do the right thing,” John says, half growl, half whimper, his breath gusting over Sherlock’s jaw , then gone as he laps his way back into Sherlock’s mouth. He kisses with intense focus, nips and swipes of soft, wet tongue until Sherlock reaches for more, when he dives dizzyingly deep, stealing Sherlock’s breath and demanding his undivided attention. 

He’d forgotten. He doesn’t know how he could have, but he’d forgotten how  _ completely _ John kisses, how it makes him ache, how untethered he feels, how he wants to shout his joy to the universe at the same time he wants to weep with the weight of it. 

John pulls back and tips his forehead to touch Sherlock’s panting mouth. “But I just don’t know what the right thing is. All I know is what I want. I don’t know if this is the best day of my life or the worst thing I’ve ever done, but God, I can’t bear another minute with you thinking I don’t want you – that I don’t love you!”

Sherlock barely has time to breathe before John finds his mouth again, filling it with longing and love. He moves against Sherlock, touching him everywhere and igniting his senses until he’s less than a step away from overwhelmed.

When they pause to gasp in some much needed air, Sherlock tips his head back to rest against the wall. John immediately noses into his throat, breathing him in and scattering gusted kisses down his neck and into the collar of his t-shirt. Kissing the exact spot of the healing fracture.

The light spills down from John’s landing and up from the entrance hallway; it cocoons them in this soft half-dark that feels both intimate and safe, as if part of them lives in the very fabric of this place now.

“Bed, with me,” Sherlock murmurs, his throat vibrating against John’s lips. “Please, J..John.”

John nods and steps back. He waits for Sherlock to push away from the wall and turn to his bedroom door, then puts a hand against his back as if he cannot bear to lose contact with him completely. Sherlock glances over his shoulder, then reaches back and twines his fingers through John’s, towing him into his bedroom, only letting go to remove his dressing gown and climb under the sheets. 

John stands watching him and only moves once Sherlock tips his head and looks up at him in question. He makes short work of his half undone jeans, pushing them off his hips and stepping out of them, and his t-shirt follows it onto the pile on the floor. 

Sherlock hasn’t seen John’s scar clearly before, and the dimness of the room prevents his scrutiny now. John habitually wears vests under his clothes and a t-shirt to bed, but shows no hesitation at baring himself now, climbing onto the bed beside Sherlock in just his boxer shorts. 

He waits, looking Sherlock up and down. Reaching out an uncertain hand, he waits for Sherlock’s nod before he touches his sternum. He runs a hand over Sherlock’s side and hip and down his thigh before retracing his path, then repeating the action. Next time he grasps the sheet.

“Okay?” he whispers. 

Sherlock wishes he could do more than nod, but John appears happy with his wordless answer, uncovering Sherlock to his feet. It’s hardly cold in his bedroom but Sherlock shivers anyway.

Now his eyes are adjusting, Sherlock can see John is kneeling awkwardly, trying to keep his weight off his healing knee. He can make out the shape and location of his shoulder scar, which still looks to be slightly darker than the rest of his skin. And he can see the fabric of John’s boxers being distorted by the outline of his very erect penis. It’s a match for his own. 

At Sherlock’s gentle suggestion, John lays down beside him and immediately rolls into his embrace and kisses him. The feeling is sublime. Their bodies touch from their lips to their shins as they twine themselves together, constantly seeking more ways to increase the amount of contact.

Sherlock cannot quite believe he is allowed to have this. After the overcoming injuries and the speech issues and battling the misunderstandings, he has to admit that he hadn’t truly believed he deserved to have John Watson in his arms and in his bed. His dismissal and his arrogance had steered them so far off course, he’s humbled that John has accepted him back. 

Their breaths hitch and catch as their hands skim sensitive skin and sweet places, and they hum and groan in concert when their groins brush together, both seeking to repeat the sensation again.

Sherlock’s cock thrums with the need to find friction, his balls tightening and adding to the delicious ache of their embrace.

“John,” Sherlock says in a voice rough with want, “Help me with these.” He pulls feebly at his own pyjamas. 

John’s hands are gentle and sure as he helps Sherlock remove one side of his shirt, then work it over his sore shoulder. They only hesitate for a moment when he slips his thumbs under the waistband of Sherlock’s pyjama bottoms and eases them over his erection and off his hips to where he can kick them off himself. He is fully hard now and his cock touches a smear of moisture onto his belly as it is freed from confinement. Strange, he wonders, how being on such display does not make him feel self-conscious. Not with John. He may have lost his words, but not his ability to see what he’d wondered if he’d ever recapture; the humbling reverence in John’s gaze as he pauses to take in the sight of Sherlock. 

“Beautiful,” he whispers.

From what he can see of John’s face Sherlock understands that he means it. He seems oddly moved by what he has achieved, his hand stretching out to touch for a few breathless seconds before he lays back down to work his own boxers off, sliding them down his legs and kicking them onto the floor with their other discarded clothing. 

If their bodies aligning before was sublime, then the sensation of their skin touching everywhere is beyond description. Sherlock is overwhelmed by John, with the warmth of him, the friction of the hair on his chest and legs, the silky spring of his pubic hair, the way his scent changes across the landscape of his body, the hint of softness at his belly and the play of muscles in his arse and thighs – he wants to slow down and explore each new aspect of John in turn, and give it the attention it deserves. But tonight is not the right time for that, he understands. Their pace isn’t frantic, but it is building and they need the certainty and shared realisation of a climax soon, this first time.

John is the first to remember their recent infirmity when his knee tries to hook Sherlock’s thigh closer. He grunts and flinches but kisses Sherlock’s queries away. A minute later it is Sherlock who hisses as he reaches too far and his shoulder sends a flash of sharp white pain lancing down his left side.

John disentangles himself, stroking a soothing hand along Sherlock’s flank as he gazes up at him, hopelessly out of his depth. Pausing with his hand on Sherlocks hip, John looks at him through lowered lashes.

“Can I just… try something?” 

Sherlock nods immediately. Whatever John wants Sherlock will endeavour to make his – John really doesn’t need to ask permission since there is nothing Sherlock could come up with that he wouldn’t want to try with this man. He frowns when John swivels and lays down the opposite way around. He runs a finger up the inside of Sherlock’s thigh, making him twitch and the hairs on his arms and legs rise.

“It might be easier on both of us this way,” John tells him, dropping kisses in the wake of his fingertip.

“Yes,” Sherlock agrees, hoping he sounds knowledgeable and eager. He’s not completely without sexual experience but after a few experiments in that vein, he’d given it up as a waste of his time when there were other things he could be deriving pleasure from that were as easy to come by and involved less confusing interactions. He’s done some research in the past for cases, but most of his knowledge is theoretical and with the addition of his emotional response to the man, he is thoroughly unprepared when John laps a soft tongue across the tip of his cock.

His back arches and he shudders at the sensation, and John chuckles a little bit. 

“Good?” he asks.

“Oh, yes,” Sherlock breathes, and John takes this as an invitation to take him into his mouth and suck him with long, sweet swallows, bobbing his head over Sherlock’s groin while grasping his hip to hold him steady.

For a while, Sherlock cannot register anything but the feel of John’s mouth on him – he swaps up his technique with kisses and licks and long, sweeping laps before swallowing him down again. Sherlock is a mess of gasps and muttered curses, adrift on an endorphin high. The glimpses he can get of John’s devotions are too much, too perfect and he closes his eyes and tries to hang on to his self-control.

He only recognises his lack of reciprocation when his eyelids twitch open at a particularly heart-stopping touch and he sees John’s perfect cock twitching and bobbing before him. John has his legs braced to take pressure off his knee but also to get the stability he needs to lavish attention on Sherlock.

Without needing to think twice, Sherlock reaches out to grasp the soft, velvety skin over the solid thickness of John’s cock. John groans and pauses, but soon resumes with new enthusiasm.

Shuffling closer without dislodging John is hard as he keeps getting distracted by John’s obvious skill, but eventually he is close enough to press a kiss to the exposed tip of John’s glans. The flavour of him bursts over his tongue and Sherlock is undone - he has to have more. Echoing John’s technique from earlier gets some very gratifying moans, but soon Sherlock is making his own way, testing and researching this new piece of John. He loves the contrast in the texture of John’s bollocks compared to his shaft. He loves taking this fragile part of John, so delicate, into his mouth and tasting the sweat saltiness there, quite different to the brine flavour of his pre-ejaculate. He traces the thick vein that runs the length of John’s cock and experiments with the pressure of his tongue.

All this while he is losing the battle against his body’s need to climax. John’s hands have been doing some exploring of their own and all the places he has touched are singing to Sherlock about how good it will feel in thirty more seconds when his body tips over into orgasm, or in twenty seconds, or in, oh god, three seconds if he does that thing with his knuckle again and…

Sherlock convulses, and his mind empties into the brilliant silence of orgasm. Pulling his mouth from John to string together an incoherent mess of swearwords, invocations and John’s name – over and over – he pulses into John’s mouth and tries to retain enough sense not to choke him with his enthusiasm. 

Returning to himself slowly, panting and shivery, Sherlock rubs the pad of his thumb over John’s frenulum which makes him huff and strain. Sherlock swipes his tongue across the same spot and John moans around his reverent mouthful of Sherlock. More pressure, less pressure, quick laps and long, wet sweeps over that one spot and John is gabbling his name, warning him that he’s about to…

Sherlock takes the head of John’s cock into his mouth and sucks, and he groans, long and low. Bitter musk and salt flood his mouth and Sherlock doesn't miss a drop, cradling John’s cock with his tongue until he stops twitching, when he reluctantly lets him go.

Long seconds pass and Sherlock has no ability or desire to calculate exactly how long – his body is heavy and humming with release, pleasure and pride. Sherlock’s head is pillowed on John’s leg and he thinks that the man's softening cock is a wonder of trust and potential. The skin of John’s thigh is warm and sticky from their exertions, and when Sherlock rolls his head to kiss it, John hums in pleased lassitude.

Eventually John stirs and rouses himself sufficiently to turn back around, pulling a pillow under his head and waiting while Sherlock does the same, then he finds the sheets and straightens them until they are both covered. 

Settled now, they smile soft smiles and share a few brief kisses. But mostly they gaze at each other’s faces, as if counting the ways their new understanding has changed them. More honesty and more acceptance, Sherlock thinks. He cannot recall ever having stared into someone’s eyes for such a period of time, but it’s not uncomfortable and neither of them feel the need to speak to break the spell for long minutes.

Eventually John has to get up to use the loo, but he leaves with a kiss and returns quickly with more.

“Have you been back? To your mind palace?” he murmurs as the city outside finally begins to become still. “Am I still there?”

What is it about this man that provokes him to ask the most pertinent and insightful questions, even without knowing that he has?

“No,” Sherlock hedges. “I’ve been a little he… busy recovering from a head injury. And persuading an idiot I know to fff… fall in love with me.”

John huffs. “Didn’t need too much persuading, did I? Any idiot could have seen that I’ve been in love with you for months.”

Sherlock mimics John’s huff and rolls his eyes.

“Well, next time you’re there, just don’t stay away so long, eh?”

Sherlock smiles. “I won’t. Wouldn’t want to miss... the real thing.”

The flood has come. Through fissures that became cracks that became channels, his words have returned. The weight of them even now pushes the dam apart and pummels it to grains with the force of what lies behind. Sherlock knows that it won’t be unmade in an instant and that he will need time and practice, but already he can feel them, breaking loose, ready for him to speak.

What he didn’t know was that it wasn’t only his language that was held back; his emotions, his ability to feel sentiment, his capacity to love and be loved follows behind. A reservoir full, a lake… an  _ ocean  _ that has been dammed behind doubt and denial, contained at such pressure that it had shrunk down to almost nothing, but with the mass of a star. It too had sought the tiniest paths, the quiet, unseen ways and had found an opportunity through John to move further and push harder until it broke across. Now it spills through the gap, its pace outstripping his words and Sherlock is filled with the force of it, untried and unfettered as it is. His cells vibrate with its potential.

John’s eyelids droop and widen, blink and close, but his smile lingers.

“I love you, John Watson,” Sherlock says.

Because he’s allowed to. 

Because now, finally, he can.


	14. Epilogue - Home from Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So here we are at the final chapter. I have to say thank you again to J.Baillier who was my harbour in a storm. Hey! J! I wrote another weather reference - what do I win??? And thank you to Agirlsname and to 88thParallel who were kind enough to listen to me moan about this story for months! 
> 
> AND thank you to everyone who has read, kudos-ed or commented on this story - it makes me so happy that people have enjoyed it. xxx

The rain teases at the windows, now spattering and fitful, now drumming with joyful abandon, now clattering petulantly with the gusting wind. 

Sherlock stands in the doorway and observes before he commits himself to entering their sitting room. He’s left this space until the end of this little exploration deliberately, uncertain about what he’d find - or what he'd hoped to find.

There’s tea on the coffee table, recently made, a fire laid in the hearth but not yet put to the match, his coat drying on the hook, and the rugby’s on with the TV turned almost down to silent. John’s laptop is on the desk, open to his blog. Sherlock’s violin and bow are lying across his chair. It’s like a theatre scene of their life, waiting for the actors to take to the stage, anticipation, excitement and fear in balance that a breeze or a feather’s weight could throw off.

Of course, this room is also a comprehensive catalogue of Dr John Hamish Watson, RAMC (Rtd); the bullet holes in the wall hold the memories of every time John has carried or used his gun, the skull contains instances of John’s medical skills, the paperback by John’s chair is a bibliography of everything he’s read as far as Sherlock is aware, his violin bow is a list of everything he has ever played for John and how it was received, the cushion on his chair records his family background and his RAMC mug, steaming on the table is all Sherlock knows of John’s military history. Almost every item in this room is an aide-memoire for some aspect of John. There’s a lot to save as he and John combine their lives and each new snippet of information is eagerly captured, pored over and carefully filed away for future reference.

There’s no sign of anyone here though and Sherlock takes a deep breath, telling himself that’s what he’d expected so he can’t be disappointed. He has John in his real life in fresh and astonishing ways now, the ebullience of their newly declared love tempered and deepened by their months of cohabiting. It had been greed, pure and simple, to hope that his companion from his recovery might have remained. Clearly, Sherlock had created him as a point of stability when he’d most needed one. He cannot bemoan his loss when he has already gained everything. The avatar of John in his mind palace has merged with the real one.

He and John are both happy at a cellular level, as Sherlock explains it. ‘Disgustingly smug’ is how Mycroft has phrased it. Sherlock doesn’t really care about such semantics, of course – they are working out how their new relationship status can be incorporated into their daily lives. Sherlock hasn’t become the perfect flatmate and partner overnight; he’s still curt, condescending and volatile and John is still sarcastic, irritable and stoic. They are both strong-willed individuals and some element of friction is to be expected, but they are working on communicating better, being sensitive to the other’s needs and Sherlock thinks they have both made progress towards a better understanding. Besides, some of their disagreements have been resolved very satisfactorily through a physical expression of differences and compromises, or ‘make-up sex’ as John calls it. 

“Are you coming in then?” John asks.

His head pops around the corner from the kitchen.

“I wasn’t sure if you’d be here still,” Sherlock says, stepping into the room and watching with a smile as John returns with a packet of Sherlock’s favourite biscuits, taking the comment in his stride with a quizzical eyebrow dip and a shrug.

He shuffles into the corner of the sofa, depositing his booty next to their mugs and picking up the TV remote. In his home scented jumper and socked feet, he looks like the epitome of the perfect Sunday and Sherlock is hit with a sudden rush of gratitude.

John pats the spot beside him, his eyes half on the rugby. Sherlock can’t help but be drawn to the invitation and drops onto the sofa, swivelling immediately to lay his head in John’s lap. He sighs and straightens his legs, stretching his feet out over the end and rolling his head to get the best angle. John’s fingers waste no time in finding and toying with the curl beside Sherlock’s ear that won’t stop sticking out, no matter what he does. 

With his comfort ensured, Sherlock thinks about the rest of his mind palace. He’s spent some time walking the rooms and corridors, taking an inventory of the damage caused by his injury. There have been casualties and things in places that they shouldn’t be but he’s correcting them as he finds them and the elements are clicking back into place in a very encouraging manner. 

“Did you ever doubt that we could have this?” Sherlock asks aloud.

John digs further into Sherlock’s hair and combs it through his fingers. “How do you mean?”

Sherlock tilts his head a little to guide John’s fingers to a neglected spot of his scalp. “When we first met, did you consider that we might never be more than flatmates or friends?”

“‘Course I did; isn’t that why you got so worried how things were going to go the second time around at Angelo’s.” John reaches over and grabs a Hob-Nob. “You were a bit of a berk that first time, to be fair. All that crap about ‘relationships not being your area’ and… what was it?”

“Married to my work?” Sherlock admits, hearing how pretentious he’d sounded, and how convinced he’d been that he had no need of connection and understanding, let alone companionship and affection. “In my defence, you gave up very easily. One rehearsed sentence from me, and your position crumbled.” 

“I didn’t know what I stood to gain, then,” John protests, taking a bite of biscuit and popping the rest into Sherlock's obediently opened mouth. “Plus you had a great little flat and I didn’t want to get chucked out so soon.” 

It is impossible for Sherlock to fathom now, why he had convinced himself that he was better without sentimental impulses. He has loving, demonstrative parents and a brother whose love comes in the guise of interference and antagonism, but at some point in his past, obviously long since deleted, he had found emotion too painful or destabilising and stifled it. He had replaced sentimental connection with other pursuits which he had then made utterly central to his being; chemistry then cocaine, and then crime solving. If he was engaged completely in one of those placeholders for feeling then he had no need of it, which also went some way to explaining the destructive episodes when he was denied access to them. He’d forced sentiment into an imaginary lead-lined box and dropped it down a metaphorical well, never to be opened again.

Until John. 

Something about John had made him rethink all those years of solitude and denial. An army veteran with a limp, an attitude and a love of risky situations had effectively broken down every one of Sherlock’s arguments against romantic entanglement and given him much more than he’d imagined was his due.

Sherlock looks up at him and wonders at the miracle of John Watson. A chance encounter in a chaotic universe had put them together – provided the answer to each other’s questions, the fulfillment of each other’s shortcomings. The odds against meeting the one person on the planet who can see beyond the persona and recognise his hidden heart despite the deflections and the obstacles are incalculable. For that person to then love him in the same way that he is learning to love John is nothing short of miraculous.

Or perhaps that is Sherlock’s nascent romantic streak talking - it’s proving hard to hit the optimum level of enthusiasm for his newest obsession: being in love with John. He finds it easy enough to slip into his detached persona when he needs to focus on a case, but returning to being John’s partner is something he finds he enjoys rather ardently; some might say passionately. He’s expecting the first flush of their happiness to settle, but it shows no signs of diminishing thus far.

Either way, Sherlock is enjoying it enormously, and as a bonus, it is making Mycroft unutterably uncomfortable, to the extent that he has taken to calling ahead when he visits, giving Sherlock ample time to either vacate the vicinity or, his personal favourite, initiate sex with John, making it inescapably apparent to Mycroft what they have just been doing. John hasn’t caught on to that yet, but for an idiot, he’s pretty damn smart, so Sherlock needs to… Oh! Or maybe he _has_ caught on to it and is on board with the plan to horrify his brother. Things like this – these are the reasons that Sherlock loves John as he does. Deeply. Boundlessly. Unceasingly. 

“And _of course_ it occurred to me later that you might have just been saying one thing and thinking another, but by then I assumed we’d lost our momentum,” John muses. “You were telling people you were a sociopath and blazing a path through London’s finest, pissing them off as you went and I was an angry, depressed man who was insisting he wasn’t gay. It wasn’t exactly a match made in heaven, was it?”

“What changed your mind?” Sherlock asks, still not completely secure enough not to feel the thrill of anxiety about the answer.

“Perspective. Living with you for three days was enough to find out that the sociopath thing was a load of crap and that the Sherlock Holmes persona was just a front for everything else you are; funny, generous, gentle, reflective…”

Finding a particularly pleasing curl, John twines it around his index finger and watches it spring back again and again while Sherlock blinks back the wetness welling along his bottom eyelashes.

“We might not be an obvious match, but we chose each other and modified ourselves, made compromises – decided the other was worth making the effort for. And after all that, you’re still a sulky drama queen and I’m still a grumpy old bastard, so still recognisably ourselves. I think we’re pretty damn perfect for each other, Sherlock Holmes.”

How does he say these heart-felt, time stopping things without any evidence of effort or embarrassment. Sherlock hopes that one day, he will be in a position to return such sentiments with the ease and everyday insouciance that John shows. 

He thinks about getting up, about walking to the other door where the dogs are waiting and the air carries the tang of the sea. He thinks about showing John how he loves him and the place that he has made for him in his life. Their forever. But even as the notion arises, Sherlock decides that there are years and years between now and then, time for them to grow into those people and so many adventures, big and small, to happen on the way. He doesn't want to hurry them towards happily ever after, he wants them to live it instead. 

“You still shouldn’t be here, you know,” Sherlock murmurs, swallowing around the tightness in his throat

“What? Home?”

“In my mind palace.”

John grunts. “I don’t think I can be held responsible for the convoluted workings of your psyche. It’s not my fault if you adore me so much that you need two of me to satisfy your massive ego,” he smirks, his voice loving and amused.

Sherlock rolls his head and presses his nose into John’s stomach, inhaling deeply despite the man’s ticklish squawk and protests. Sherlock ignores them – he’d been right, John’s jumper smells deliciously of them and is given new heights of delectability by being heated by the man’s skin, and being positioned over the slight softness that John is self-conscious about, but that Sherlock always makes sure to kiss first when he undresses. 

“I do, you know,” Sherlock admits to John’s navel. 

“Do what?”

“Adore you,” Sherlock mutters and turns to watch the hopelessly infatuated smile that breaks across John’s face.

“As you should,” John says, in a mocking echo of his scolding voice. “You should tell me so.”

“I just did,” Sherlock protests.

“No… me,” John says pointedly and complete with raised eyebrows and a tip of his head that indicates outside. 

“I think you already know.” Sherlock reaches up and brushes his fingers over the bright prickle of John’s scruff. 

John hums and lifts his chin to give Sherlock more access. “It’s never a hardship to hear that your boyfriend loves you, no matter how many times you’ve heard it before.”

Sherlock nods, touches the back of his fingers to John’s jaw with a gentleness he didn’t know he had in him.

He sighs back down on John’s lap, and John turns up the rugby a little when the loud rush of renewed rain skitters across the windows, his hands sinking back into Sherlock’s curls in an unconscious gesture.

He’d asked him not to stay away for too long.

Sherlock closes his eyes and turns back towards home and John.

Fin

**Author's Note:**

> I owe so much to jbaillier, who saved my veggie-bacon on this one. I don’t often work with a beta reader, but she was absolutely brilliant. Like an avenging angel, she swept in, soothed, suggested, rearranged and fact-checked on an unfinished story that I had written myself into a corner with. And while she was doing all that she was also being hilarious, clever, interesting and lovely. This story wouldn’t be half what it is without her. I have taken note of her expertise and skill, used what fitted and bent the rest until it did too. A thousand, thousand thank yous, J.
> 
> Needless to say, any remaining errors are mine. 
> 
> This story is the longest thing I have ever written and I have told myself it is suitable for the 10 year celebration because that’s about how long the damn thing feels like it’s taken to write. 
> 
> It is dedicated to jbaillier, 88th Parallel, agirlsname and missgeoffreychaucer and given with love to all the fabulous people still here after ten years of Sherlock. And to Pepe and Salads - always.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Chances Are](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26561104) by [Podfixx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Podfixx/pseuds/Podfixx)




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